


Creation

by Savaial



Category: Dr Who - Fandom
Genre: M/M, The Master is in love, The Master stops at nothing, how do I warn for self-love?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-23
Updated: 2015-11-23
Packaged: 2018-05-02 23:26:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 43,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5267837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Savaial/pseuds/Savaial
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Through a series of encounters, the Doctor and the Master align.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In With The Old

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sure someone else could do this better, but here's my shot.

“So, let me get this right. You want me to help you hunt down the Doctor even though I’ve already gone to the trouble and danger of rescuing you.” The Master eyed his future self doubtfully. “I’ve violated time laws, risked life and limb to preserve us, and you want more.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Well, of course you do. You’re me.”

The future Master paused in scrubbing his arm and scowled at his earlier self. “At this point in our life, you’re so caught up in playing with him on Earth that you can’t imagine more,” he lectured. “I’m telling you, something happens that changes everything.”

“You’re right. I can’t imagine it.” Earlier Master sat on the edge of the tub and took off his gloves. Curiosity made him feel his future self’s hair. “You can’t tell me, of course.” He paused to judge the head under his hand. “We always get a receding hairline and a Widow’s Peak.”

Newer Master allowed himself to pet himself, enjoying it. No one knew how to touch him like him. “I think I’ll let your personality come forth when I return to my own timeline,” he said thoughtfully. “Out of all of us, you have the most control.”

“I’m just an aspect of you, you know,” Older Master lectured.

“I know, of course. But, I’m hardly stable. I think you’d bring a measure of precision I’m missing. The drums finally caught up to me.” Newer Master rinsed again. “Did you wash my clothes?”

“If you can call those rags clothes,” Older Master said disdainfully. “It’s too bad you can’t choose from the TARDIS wardrobe.”

“I’ll pick something else after you dump me on Earth again,” Newer Master promised with relish. “I think the year 2030 ought to be far enough ahead that I don’t get caught up in an old trap.”

“I hope you dress with a bit more style.” Older Master got up and began rummaging in his bathroom cupboard for a good razor. “I’ve never seen me shabbier.”

Newer Master refrained from talking about being a walking corpse with effort. That hadn’t happened for him yet, and he didn’t want too much foreknowledge going into his past. “I didn’t pick out those clothes,” he protested. “But, they were better than being naked.”

Older Master looked down at him demonstratively, eyes lingering on his wet, half submerged body. “Oh, I don’t know,” he mused. “You’re fit, anyway. This body has a tendency to get soft in the midsection.”

Newer Master remembered dealing with that. At that time he hated it, but with a better perspective he felt sort of nostalgic. He’d been so calm in the head, then, comparatively.

“So, what do you want with the Doctor?” Older Master asked, putting a decent shampoo on his descendant’s head and massaging it in. It pleased him to hear himself make a noise of contentment. “Still the decadent seeker of physical contact, I see. That’s good.”

“I…” Newer Master felt himself melting. His power of speech seemed deplorably slow and thick. “Oh, you _are_ a bad man, trying to seduce your future self into relaxing his guard.”

“If you keep your mouth shut you should be safe,” Older Master murmured. “You’ve got your mental barriers up, like a wise person would. Your will is just a touch weaker than mine, but I won’t press.” He took up a pitcher and filled it with very warm water from the nearby tap, and without relinquishing his constant, soapy massage. Pouring a thin yet constant stream, he took the shampoo away with sensual slowness. “You don’t have anything better to do at the moment but relax,” he lectured softly. “My TARDIS is still computing the Doctor’s whereabouts; it’s difficult under ordinary circumstances, much less when you’re violating a few laws of time.”

Newer Master hadn’t been touched properly in a very long time. He’d allowed Lucy to try, but found her a better receptacle than an independent lover. His past self had every advantage, and he couldn’t summon much will to care.

“Do you still like…?” Older Master ran a slick thumb down Newer Master’s spine, and felt gratified at the resultant arching. Before his victim could gasp, he traced back up and over one side of his neck. “Good, you do,” he said, smiling. “Now, tell me what it is you need the Doctor for,” he urged, starting a firm, slippery neck rub.

“There’s no need for coercion,” Newer Master scolded, grabbing the offending hand and squeezing a warning.

“You can’t be serious. There’s every need.” Older Master made him look into his eyes by force of will, slightly unsettled at the evidence that his future self didn’t have as much mental control. The drums in his head gained an echo louder than the original, and he pulled out quickly. “I’m sorry,” he said sincerely. “I didn’t grasp the extent of what you said. Still, you seem to be doing well enough.”

Newer Master hated not telling his past self the source of the drums, just hated it. But, there was too much he could ruin by revealing the information. He picked up a flannel and scrubbed his face, hard. “I’ve gone insane,” he muttered. “I wish I had some of your control.”

Older Master rinsed him again and applied a good conditioner, thinking. He understood the risks involved with even the simplest disclosures. Too, he knew himself; this version of him needed a bit of care, obviously. He decided to change the subject, make them both relax a little. “Is he handsome, your Doctor?” He asked, taking up scissors and starting to cut away the worst of the blond mess on his descendant’s head.

Newer Master gave a short sigh. He threw the flannel down. “He’s always handsome in one way or seventy,” he answered, disgust dripping from him. “The ridiculous, do-gooding, bleeding wound Savior of Humanity!” He picked up the soap cake and flung it at the wall.

“Now, now,” Older Master scolded mildly, going back to kneading his future self’s neck and forcing some few degrees of relaxation with simple skill. “You knew what you were getting into. Regardless of what has happened, and I won’t ask anymore, he’s still yours; no one else can have him.”

“Well, he seems to not have that information,” Newer Master bitched. He didn’t shake off that wonderful hand, though.

“Then, you’ll have to deliver it. I know, I know, he’s remarkably stubborn and prone to flight. You’ll have to think around him.” Older Master dropped another hand down and moved the massage to full shoulders. His future self gave a mighty groan before submitting completely. “Some legends suggest that pair-bonded Time Lords can find each other with their minds. Have you tried that?”

“No, and neither have you, of course, or I’d remember it,” Newer Master pointed out. “Look, these drums used to be easier to handle; I can’t figure out why they’ve gotten so unendurable.”

Older Master swallowed at this. “I used what little compassion I had for the Doctor as a focus when things got very bad; I’m sure you remember. If it’s gotten worse, your consideration of him has faded.”

“I haven’t changed that much,” Newer Master protested. He got out of the tub and stood there, clean, dripping, and incredibly in need of rest. “I’m sure I’ve got time to sleep, in any case, and I need it.”

“Of course. You know your way around. Would you like my company?” Older Master hoped for a positive answer.

“Please.” Newer Master halfheartedly slung a towel around his waist and led the way. It would be nice to sleep in his old, favorite bedroom again. Like coming home.

“Not so fast,” Older Master said as they entered the bedroom. He jerked on the towel, making it fall off. “There’s something else you need, first.”

“I-.”

“Get on the bed. Obey me.” Older Master didn’t waste time or debate the pros and cons of manipulating his future identity. He knew what was best and could easily correct what he considered a downgrade to his system.

Older and Newer occupied the bed together before the former let the latter free of mind control. He promptly got himself viciously throat punched. They crashed together then, each vying for dominance, becoming a confused tangle of limbs. But, Older Master wasn’t weak from being torn out of time, or confused by the volume of the drums. He wrestled his future identity down to the mattress and pinned him, loving the hot rush of conquering himself.

“I don’t remember doing this!” Future Master gasped.

“That’s because I don’t let us remember it, probably,” Older Master said after a nanosecond’s reflection. “What counts is getting what you need, not that you ruminate over it endlessly and confound everything with non-linear factoid.” He let go of his future self’s hands and leaned over him, pushing their pelvises close together. “Now, I think you’re overdue for some personal intimacy. Undress me.”

Future Master got his tired arms up and began, feeling clumsy and slow. “It hasn’t been that long,” he protested, but he didn’t stop. He even followed his older self’s movements backward, standing with him to make efficient work of undressing him.

“I’m sure you regularly exhaust yourself with any willing partner you find,” Older Master assured, “but, it isn’t the raw desire you want. You want to be held.” He got his own shoes off and finished, pushing his future self back onto the bed. “You want stroked and cared for, and I’m the best for that.”

“At least until I can get it from-.”

“That might be a long time.”

“It’s ages,” Future Master complained, cutting off with a groan as his older identity ran palms down his chest and torso. “Oh, Christ, that’s good. I’d forgotten how nice my hands were."

“You’re very differently made now, that’s certain,” Older Master murmured, bringing his counterpart’s flesh to quick, aching attention with only a few strokes. “Strangely delicate, in fact.”

“I’m not,” Future Master said, but his tone held no anger. He couldn’t be angry, not now.

“You are. Look at those narrow wrists, that long throat.” Older Master smiled. He was enjoying this immensely. He brought both of his future self’s hands up to press kisses in their palms, slow and gentle, and they both trembled a little. “Good, hard muscle, though; you took care of it after regenerating.”

“Like… being strong,” Future Master managed to say. He writhed with his older identity’s attention, having forgotten how he used to possess an amazing sense of touch. “I have to be strong if I’m going to ever make the Doctor submit.”

“Oh, good for you,” Older Master said, smiling. “I approve.” He straddled in order to get full access to the throat he’d been admiring. His future identity had a neck that begged to be licked and bitten, so he indulged in both. “You’re so responsive,” he praised as Newer Master gasped and clung to his shoulders in a spasm of feel-good. Because it was his nature to be rough as well as skilled, he shoved their cocks against one another, hard. How thrilling it was to dominate himself, at last.

“Enjoying… yourself?” Future Master asked, letting a keen of pure pleasure work loose of his throat as that mouth went ever lower.

“Merely taking care of my future,” Older Master informed, forcing one of his legs to bend and prop on his shoulder. “Don’t pretend; I’m you, and I know what we like.” He paused to test a pertinent area with his finger, feeling them both shiver as he slid in. “Most especially don’t pretend when you’ve reached so much stimulation that you’re ready to mate; this part of us only lubricates under severe excitement.”

“You’re so fucking smug.” Future Master shuddered as that finger went a little deeper.

“Dominance tends to cause that in us,” Older Master reminded, sucking his future self into his mouth.

Future Master thought he might explode. Hot, wet suction on his dick felt amazing, especially when the mouth involved knew so much about him. It knew, for instance, that he liked it hard and fast at first, just to take the edge off. It also knew to gentle down after a moment and begin a little honest persuasion. That finger going up inside him wriggled a little, just barely touching his hidden heaven. He couldn’t think at all now, just lay there under the will of his dominant, older self.

And, it felt amazing.

Suck, pull, thrust and twitch… Future Master lost himself to it all. His exhausted body eagerly took the attention of his earlier self. Those jabs to his prostate electrified his spine and made him a rag doll. He leaked from his cock, and listening to his earlier self swallow it caused a complete meltdown in his pleasure centers.

“Stay with me,” Older Master urged, lifting him for entry. He slid in easily, and their moans joined in low register joy. “Never let anyone, have you?” He asked, pleased he’d been the first to have himself in this body. “I’m not stopping here, so resign yourself to it; you asked to have my control, so I’m going to give it to you. Call it an investment.”

Future Master hadn’t a clue and could have cared less at this point. Still, when his dominant, earlier self began shoving his mind into him with the rhythm of his body, he understood. “No,” he gasped, fighting, but he hadn’t any strength left. “You can’t! You need that part of yourself later!”

“I do, apparently,” Older Master agreed, not relenting a jot. “Lie still and take me.” He latched onto the deepest, most hidden area in his counterpart’s mind and fed it his compassion, all the soft things that he kept away from everyone else; a sacrifice to ensure he’d survive later. “You said you wanted the Doctor. You can’t ever get him if he can’t find something of himself in you.” He implanted the best of his personality, his eloquence first, because he’d seen the degradation of his speech first off upon meeting his future self. He held back just enough to not cripple himself.

Future Master surrendered, understanding now what had happened to him so many years ago, how he’d lost his reason by degrees. “Oh, Christ,” he moaned, feeling too much and not enough. This was why he’d had the nerve to shoot the Doctor, to throw him off a radio tower, to constantly expose him to deadly danger instead of just playing games. Because, he’d given his love away to his far future self, to fix him. It was a paradox. “You’re killing yourself!” He warned, but he’d take what was offered because he _needed_ it.

Older Master flooded him with his reason, his higher judgment while building them to a climax. “No,” he argued, “I’m saving myself. You need me, and I need you.” He took hold of his writhing future self and began a hard, relentless pumping. “We have to be whole, later, to survive. I’ll be fine, if a little raw and primitive.”

They came together, and Older Master firmly put the last of his better self into his partner’s mind, reserving only enough to function. Breathing hard, he collapsed upon himself. Curiously, laying against his future self allowed him to tap into what he’d given. It interested him, but not enough to stay very conscious for decent contemplation.

They lay there in the tangled mess of sheets a few minutes, cooling and falling. Future Master slung an arm around his older self and gave a weak laugh. “I’m such a son of a bitch,” he said.

“Yes, but you know what’s best for us, don’t we?” Older Master closed his eyes. “Set my coordinates and get on with your mission while I sleep. I’ll be shoving this memory as far down as possible; you can tap into it when you return to your own time stream. I don’t even want to know how you accomplished getting my attention when our people are so determined to never break a law of time.”

Future Master waited until his older self fell fully into cataleptic preservation, then eased out of bed. As he dressed in his wretched, ragged clothes he couldn’t help looking at what he’d been. He hadn’t known he had such sacrifice in his soul until he’d handed it to himself on a silver platter.

He realized he’d have to cross his own time stream again in order to take the place of the identity the Lord High President was dragging back into the Time War, and cursed. He had misery ahead of him, damn it. Still, he had all the control he wanted now. The drums were low and unobtrusive. He could definitely make do.

 

 

 

 


	2. Escape

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Master is a genius at multi-tasking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Small smut warning.

“He won’t reveal the location of his TARDIS, and our scanners can’t find it,” the councilman reported lowly. “The Lord President put a damper on his mind to prevent him being able to fly it, however. Even if he escapes he won’t be able to leave Gallifrey.”

“Good,” the other voice said, though by his tone the Master could tell he didn’t approve of the measures taken. “What about the Master?”

“Stable, but uncommunicative and highly aggressive,” the first man said with a sigh. “I think it’s a mistake to keep them incarcerated so close to each other.”

“No one makes it out of our prisons.” His companion said mildly. “We’ve had the Master for many months now, and his status hasn’t changed.”

“That’s exactly why I don’t trust the situation.”

The sound of papers and files shifting.

“I don’t like this at all,” the second man confessed. “The Doctor did what he had to do. In his situation I might have done exactly the same. The Lord President is insane.”

“Keep your voice down. He hears nearly everything.”

“I know he does. Those Rassilonite relics bestow powers that corrupt. He’s nearly god-like at this point. How long before he decides to enact the protocol to take us into Ascension even without the Dalek menace? He wants to take Gallifrey into the planes of thought consciousness. I rather _enjoy_ having a body, don’t you?”

The voices moved away. The Master waited, and sure enough, here came his contingent of prison guards for a round of thrashing him. He wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of making any noises, not even of pain.

 

**

 

“We found his TARDIS.”

“Where is it?”

“On Capitol grounds, locked up tight. No one can get inside it.”

The second man, who the Master now recognized as the Castellan, made a muffled noise of laughter. “It’s a Type 40,” he argued, clearly delighted the Doctor’s TARDIS was thwarting the Lord High President.

“A mutated Type 40,” his companion corrected. “No one’s ever seen a TARDIS so… evolved. It was a museum piece when the Doctor stole her, a curiosity; now, it’s quite different.”

“Are you saying the vessel has developed so far as to successfully resist all the equipment designed to crack into a TARDIS?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying. She has defensive capabilities and cannot even be forced into single-plane; she refuses to submit to any tampering whatsoever, and the president is gnashing his teeth over it.”

“I hope the historians are making note of this.”

“They are. I hear they attend every time a new method of entry is attempted.”

“And, what of the Doctor himself?”

“Still not talking. I believe he’s in deep depression.”

“And, the Master?”

“Also silent. We caught a number of his guards abusing him last week. They have been relieved of duty.”

A sigh, long and low and troubled.

“There will be a reckoning, Castellan. I don’t like any of this. The Doctor has a way of escaping traps, and so does the Master. If the Doctor escapes, and he will, mind you, then he will take the Master with him. United, those two could do absolutely anything. At this point I rather believe the Doctor capable of summary execution.”

“No, he’s a known pacifist. Even the destruction of Gallifrey was only to stop the Time War. Now that we no longer have that as our history, and the Daleks are no longer a threat, he has no reason to-.”

“No reason except the maniac on the highest chair of government,” came the calm interruption.

 

**

 

“His ability to regenerate has been suspended.”

“What?”

“It took three council members with unusual psionics to accomplish it. It was done to prevent an escape.”

“I suppose the Lord High President used the Crown of Rassilon to facilitate matters?”

“He did.” The Castellan sighed. “The Doctor is recovering. Apparently his own grasp of psionics was almost enough to prevent success, and his attempts to preserve himself were… painful.”

“We are headed toward the Dark Times again, Castellan, with our latest Lord High President taking the place of Rassilon Himself.”

“I know, but what can we do? The president is nearly unstoppable with the aid of the relics. Everyone fears him. No one will stand against his tyranny.”

The voices moved down the corridor, leaving the Master with much to think about.

 

**

 

“Come here,” the Master commanded the Castellan, pushing himself against the bars of his cell.

Castellan warily approached. “We aren’t supposed to talk to you.”

“It’s the Doctor you should never let talk,” the Master argued mildly. “Tell me, what sort of block was used to suspend the Doctor’s ability to regenerate? I wasn’t aware such a thing was possible.”

“You’ve been listening to-.”

“You’ve been talking right outside my cell for months. How could I not hear?” The Master smiled, feeling vindictive power rising up within him. “Tell me about the block.”

“It’s an Omega process, developed by the Time Lord of that name,” Castellan relented, coming closer. “It is and has been forbidden since Omega’s banishment. The Doctor’s familiarity with Omega’s mind was used against him.”

“Oh, that’s a bit of brilliance,” the Master said, admiring the thought that went into that. “Who actually presided, and who was involved?”

“The president, of course, and Council members Harrume, Justinius, and Dineago.” The Castellan paused to shake his head in disapproval. “All but Justinius were willing; Justinius had to be forced. The President threatened his wife and children to get compliance.”

“What a charming man you have on the throne, Castellan,” the Master murmured.

“There’s no throne, Master.”

“Of course there is. The President is more an emperor at this point, isn’t he?” the Master suggested in the nastiest tone he could summon. “A president can be voted out, but an emperor must be overthrown, deposed, or assassinated.” He smiled. “I haven’t heard Romana’s name yet. Where is she?”

“The Lady Romanadvoretrelundar was assigned to the cleanup details for our surrounding planets before the Doctor’s capture, naturally,” Castellan answered. “She wouldn’t have allowed these recent events to take place unchallenged.”

“Oh, of course,” the Master murmured. “Aren’t you cozy in your servitude.”

“It isn’t that I enjoy any of this.”

“You won’t fight against it, which makes you _despicable_ ,” the Master said. “I would rather die than submit, especially to a Time Lord committed to destroying all of time itself.”

Castellan said nothing, merely backed away and continued down the hall briskly.

“Coward!” The Master threw at his back. “You miserable, disgusting coward!”

 

**

 

They stopped having conversations outside his cell, but the Master didn’t mind. He had his general plans sorted now. First, he started the long process of sorting through his exhaustive data banks for any information on Omega, coming up with a surprisingly comprehensive amount. It took him a week to satisfactorily hypothesize what the Council must’ve done to the Doctor’s mind, and another four days to extrapolate a reversal. He needed the Doctor’s TARDIS to escape Gallifrey, and apparently the Doctor himself, so fair was fair. Better to go in with an offer, yes?

The second step was to develop a way to unclamp the knowledge damper on the Doctor’s mind, the deliberate blank-out the council used to ensure the Doctor wouldn’t remember how to fly his own ship. This was actually the most important part of the escape plan, so he spent a week pondering the issue. When satisfied, he moved on to devising the more physical aspects of escape; getting out of the cell and getting to the Doctor in order to free him, too.

The Master decided his biggest obstacle wasn’t in getting himself or his needed escort out of the cell block, but in transportation to the Doctor’s TARDIS. Once in the locked compound of the capitol he’d be able to improvise as they moved, but the capitol lay quite a distance from these cells. He needed something swift and accurate and unstoppable. He needed a Time Ring.

 

**

 

One year passed. The Master, patient like a spider, only used the time wisely. He sharpened his mental skills on the guards, causing internal disputes and physical fights with psionic gaslighting. With nothing better to do he was able to increase his range massively. In the olden days he’d had to satisfy himself by direct eye contact with his victims. Now, he could effect changes in a subject for fifty feet. But, he didn’t do too much. No, he kept his interference at such a minimum, and at such perfect opportunities that no one suspected his increase in power.

“Councilor Flavia’s coming,” he heard a guard say. “Newly regenerated. I heard she looks great.”

“Anything’d be better than what she had,” someone answered. “What’s she coming here for?”

“Interrogate the Doctor. He still hasn’t spoken a word.”

Laughter.

“If we couldn’t get him to talk, how does she figure she can?”

“Feminine wiles, stupid.”

“On the Doctor? He’s as bent as they come.”

“He isn’t! He had a family once.”

“You’re both stupid. He swings both ways,” someone added in a nasty tone. “Like any normal person, I might add.”

The Master rolled his eyes. Who cared?

“She’ll be here in twenty minutes, so look sharp.”

The Master sat back and waited, thinking. Councilor Flavia had a fondness for jewelry, he remembered. She’d been known to wear an antique Time Ring, too, a hand-me-down from Pre-Rassilon times. This might be his chance to implement his plans. He’d have to separate the woman from a contingent of security, though, which bore consideration.

In less than twenty minutes he heard a multitude of people start down the cell block.

“He’s in here, Councilor Flavia; we keep him and the Master in the same block to better watch them.”

“Too much power in one place,” came a sharp, feminine voice. “I’d put them in separate blocks.”

“But, Councilor Flavia, they aren’t friends. In fact, they’re well known adversaries,” the first voice protested. “The Master practically lives to aggravate the Doctor and sabotage his plans.”

“I see you’ve never perused Earth literature,” Flavia replied, her voice stronger. In seconds she stood outside the Master’s cell, her nose wrinkling in distaste. “You don’t allow the prisoners to bathe?”

“We hose them down twice a month; anything more is a massive security risk.” The lead guard made a gesture toward the Master. “This one can murder others while sleeping.”

The Master looked into the councilor’s eyes and held her in one place, planting a suggestion to return alone. Then, he simply let her go. He daren’t force it or take more than a few seconds, or it would raise suspicion. He hoped the frission of sexual deviance he’d pushed would prove tempting. In his experience, women liked bad boys. He was the ultimate bad boy, right? He cocked his hip at her and turned his head to one side, both aggressive and coy. _I’ll give you such a wild ride. And, no one will know you fucked me. That’s right. Take a second look_.

“Have him cleaned up, regardless, and shave him,” Flavia said slowly. “Take me to the Doctor.”

 

**

 

“Well, you look better,” Flavia said.

The Master lifted his head. She’d returned alone, the weak-willed thing, and with her classic Time Ring around her wrist. And, ooh, was that a stun baton? He looked closer. It was. She’d come prepared to force him into sex.

The Master didn’t respect rape. There were so many ways to subjugate, to control others. A universe of finesse to achieve and attempt, actually; he’d never lowered himself to dominate with his cock. It was base and utterly beneath his talent. The woman went down another six notches in his mind. He made a show of putting his hands into the automatic clamps the guards used when having to enter his cell. They locked him in place. “You don’t have to use that on me,” he said, putting a slight tremor in his voice.

“I’m not a fool,” Flavia said, entering his cell. “You’re violent, unhinged, homicidal and without a moral code. However, you’re also quite attractive, and I’d rather break in my new body with a vigorous criminal than with the current choices available.”

“Power hungry social climbers and well meaning sops need not apply?” The Master asked. “Well, you’re perfectly welcome to have me if that’s what you want. I haven’t had a woman in quite awhile.” _Closer_ , he thought. _Come closer_. He didn’t want to take a chance on a long-range psionic attack with his latest, best chance at freedom. Actually, he could understand Flavia’s predicament, and he had to reevaluate slightly; she hadn’t come to rape him, only to take advantage of his incarceration. More like coercion.

“I’m glad you understand the loneliness of being a proper female in the old boys club,” Flavia said, walking around him. She put the stun baton in a corner. “A proper female,” she repeated. “Do you know what a proper female thinks of the current regime?”

The Master eyed her, interest growing. “You don’t approve of it?”

“Exactly.” Flavia stroked a single finger down his left arm lock, and it snapped open. “And, you’re well known for your hypnotic talent, your ability to escape…” She opened his right arm lock and stepped back. “I can guess what you’ll do with your freedom. So, pick up the stun gun and use it.” As she spoke she took off her Time Ring and placed it on his filthy cot. “It’ll only keep me unconscious about thirty minutes, upon which time I’ll be obliged to start shouting for help like a good victim.”

The Master smiled a little. “You’re a very obliging captor.”

“No, I’m a very helpful traitor,” she corrected. “Hurry.”

The Master, oddly glad he didn’t have to hurt the cagy female, picked up the stun gun and used it on her, picking a place on her body that wouldn’t sustain much burn. Then, he took the Time Ring and walked out. The Doctor’s scent was easy to follow.

The lack of guards didn’t disturb him, because he knew this time of evening all of them were taking a meal. Still, he had to hurry. The Time Ring was fully functional, thankfully. All he’d have to do is get the Doctor’s hand on it while he managed their destination. But first he had to take the damper off the Doctor’s mind.

He stood outside the appropriate cell, swallowing hard at the amount of damage to his old adversary. He’d been beaten so often and so thoroughly that his natural healing couldn’t keep up. He had maybe two weeks worth of hair on his face, not enough to hide multiple bruises. Like a broken doll, he slumped in a corner. He had no amenities, not even a cot, just a pail to eliminate in.

Using the stun gun boosted on its highest, lethal setting, the Master short-circuited the lock on the Doctor’s cell and entered as the klaxon sounded. “Wake up,” he said harshly, slapping his face. “Give me your hand.”

The Doctor, groaning, managed to get his eyes open and reach for the Time Ring, all the abuse he’d suffered not enough to prevent instantaneous evaluation of his situation. Still, he wasn’t fast enough. A guard rushed the cell and entered, cursing. The Master turned and bludgeoned him even as he activated the Ring.

They materialized outside the capitol impound. This pleased the Master, because he hadn’t known if they’d move the area or not. He got an arm under the Doctor’s and forced him into a swift walk. “Straighten up,” he ordered. “Where’s your spirit?”

Groaning, the Doctor rallied. He still needed help, but he moved a lot faster. The Master saw waxen sweat beading on his forehead, and his muscles spasmed with worrying regularity.

“There she is,” the Master said. They’d been minutes from the Doctor’s precious machine. “Open her, Doctor.”

The Doctor held out a hand and weakly snapped his fingers. The TARDIS obligingly opened her doors. The Master got them inside and instantly knelt to focus on the Doctor, who’d dropped to his knees. “Look at me,” he commanded, taking the Doctor’s face in his hands.

Dark eyes met dark eyes, and the Master slid inside the mind of his precious enemy.

The Doctor’s intelligence seethed and swirled like a turbulent ocean, a maelstrom. Lightning strike synapses struck everywhere but at the Master. None of the Doctor’s anger was directed at him. The Master rode an eddy down to the first layer of tampering, a structure built to keep the Doctor ignorant of how to fly. Summoning his will, the Master smashed the lock into brilliant glittery pieces, and the Doctor gasped at having his freedom restored so swiftly, so brutally.

“Not done,” the Master informed, going farther and farther down into the Omega encoding. He found the biological germ and crushed it, sickened by the deed that had made it in the first place. No Time Lord should ever have his natural biology altered; he’d had quite enough of that becoming human with a Chameleon Arch, thanks.

“Okay, get up,” he said, hauling the Doctor upright. “We’ve got less than two minutes to get your TARDIS out of range.”

They united, not moving as fast as either would like, but determined. “Get us out of here, old girl,” the Doctor murmured, stroking the console.

“You aren’t setting coordinates!” The Master shouted, busily releasing the brakes and engaging the flight stabilizers.

“I don’t have to; the TARDIS knows where I need to go.” The Doctor sagged to the floor and closed his eyes. In seconds he was unconscious.

The TARDIS engaged flight.

The Master stood there, victorious and grimly pleased. He’d won another round with the High Council. He rather thought even the Doctor would congratulate him if awake and aware.

 

**

 

The Doctor awoke in a hot, pleasant bath, propped up on smooth hardness. He cracked an eye open to get an instant view of the Master sitting opposite him in one of the TARDIS’ better hot tubs. Those dark eyes practically vibrated with the power of the mind behind. “I feel like I’ve been hit with a cement lorry,” he croaked.

The Master smiled a little and tossed a flannel at him. It landed on his chest with a wet splat. “You look it,” he concurred.

Slowly, the Doctor got the cloth and attempted cleaning his face. It stung. He grimaced and quit. “So, how many did you kill getting us free?”

“No one,” the Master answered readily. “Well, I doubt the guard I bludgeoned feels kindly disposed, but he’s alive.” He reached a well made arm out and grabbed a tray off the closed toilet. “Do you really shave with a straight razor?”

The Doctor looked at the tray of soaps and emollients designed for shaving. Some of them he recognized and some he didn’t. But, that really was his razor lying there. For some reason the sight of it made it all the more clear that he was back on his TARDIS and not in a prison cell. He closed his eyes a second or two to gather himself. “Yes,” he answered.

“Too weak?” The Master’s voice came to his ears as calm and even a touch kindly. “They beat the hell out of you.”

“Wouldn’t cooperate.” The Doctor shrugged.

The Master eyed the tray. “Want me to?”

The Doctor managed to lift an eyebrow. “Awfully kind.”

“Not at all. I want to.” The Master leaned up and grabbed his shoulder, forcing him to face the other way and putting him in the crook of his arm.

The Doctor looked up at him, feeling quite helpless but not caring much. The Master wouldn’t have saved him only to slit his throat in the bath. He was whimsical, but not that capricious. The man’s hair had grown very long. Such darkness in those eyes.

The Master, moving slowly, spread silky soap on the Doctor’s face with only his fingertips. It felt tender and loving. The contrast made the Doctor shiver; beaten regularly by his long-missed people, but his best enemy touched him like a lover. Sweetly.

“We _**are**_ lovers, of a sort,” the Master replied, having heard his mind. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about you and me, Doctor; night after night, lying in a filthy cell, able to catch the wisping trail of your artron in the recirculated air.” He wound his fingers in the Doctor’s hair and gripped to keep his head still, but not painfully. Still, the gesture of dominance made the Doctor’s groin twinge slightly. “Thinking, thinking, thinking, thinking past the drums and the confinement,” he murmured. He reached for the razor. “Measuring you against other enemies and understanding why I cherish you above all others.”

The Doctor couldn’t close his eyes. He watched that shining blade come up and arc for descent. The Master held it perfectly, but of course he would; he had renaissance in his soul. The gentle scrape became a long, long and expert pass over his bruised face. The Master cleverly avoided his injuries. Stroke after stroke, easy and graceful, the Master glided away the rough hair, never pausing except to rinse the blade. Feeling stunned, the Doctor just lay there and experienced this complete newness.

“Intimate, isn’t it?” The Master asked, his tone low and soothing. He cleaned around the Doctor’s mouth very carefully. “Can you feel the aftershock of me in your mind?”

“Yes.” The Doctor indeed felt the Master’s residual presence. In a few seconds he’d destroyed work that took three experts in psionics a few days to accomplish. “Your psychic imprint is incredible. You haven’t been wasting your time like I have.”

“Oh, be generous with yourself,” the Master chided, moving the razor down his jaw line. “They were ignoring me; you were the important one to break first. I had plenty of hours to fill with honing my willpower to a sharp edge. It wasn’t like I spent a year meshing with the non-sentient power of satellites, aligning my artron field with solar radiation in order to become completely invincible to weapons while billions of humans gave me telekinetic power.” He smiled. “Upon reflection, that was really impressive. Couldn’t appreciate it fully at the time.”

“You like it?” The Doctor asked, suddenly charmed.

The Master’s fleeting, answering grin showed his eye teeth. “Yes, idiot,” he replied. He moved on to shaving the other side of the Doctor’s face. “I can appreciate your finesse and patience, if not your ability to use my own weapons against me.” The grip in the Doctor’s hair briefly tightened, and he shook him a little with the razor safely pulled back. “You’re brilliant, I admit it.”

“I really think its you who’s brilliant,” the Doctor told him.

“No, no, I’m an artist,” the Master argued. “That’s often mistaken for brilliance if one paints magnificent pictures.” He resumed, his face thoughtful. “Still, I sacrifice the final portrait in favor of getting perfect hues and perfect strokes; it isn’t often I finish a work.”

The Doctor understood his meaning. He even agreed. But, the Master was a genius even by their people’s standards and always had been.

“Keep your ridiculous sideburns?” The Master asked.

“Yes.” The Doctor liked his hair that way.

The Master paid heed to his fashion and went on to hacking the Doctor’s bangs into the preferred length, having to prop the man’s head on the tub to work with both hands. The Doctor watched his arm muscles ripple with each pass of the blade. Hair fell all around, even into the water. “I thought you put gel in it to make it stick straight up, but it does it all by itself,” he mused. “Your fourth body had hair a lot like this, didn’t he? Curlier, but about half sentient.”

“My hair isn’t sentient,” the Doctor answered, amused. “I wasn’t aware you paid any attention to my styles.”

“Of course I do.”

The Master started trimming his neck carefully. “Every body you take showcases another aspect of your complicated personality. Such insight allows me to tailor my approach to you.”

“So, what does this body tell you about me?” The Doctor asked, curious and more than a little pleased.

“Turn your head,” the Master said first, reaching around to the other side of his neck. He only worked a second before sighing in frustration. Getting an arm around him, he sat the Doctor up facing away. The Doctor shivered at the intimacy of having the Master’s strong, hard arm around his chest and a blade at the back of his neck.

“This is your most sensual form, to date,” the Master answered at last. “You desire companionship more than ever. Look at how young you appear, Doctor; you’re in find-a-mate mode.”

“I got myself in a lot of trouble and pain,” the Doctor argued mildly, thinking of Rose.

“That’s because you keep choosing humans.” The Master set the razor back on the tray and brought up a handful of water to wash the Doctor’s neck. “Oh, I know, you find them interesting, and they look enough like us to cause attraction, but they aren’t what you need, are they?” His fingers spread out only to clamp down. With insistent pressure he made the Doctor rest his head on his collarbone. “Feel my hearts beating against your back, Doctor. That’s what you want.”

The Doctor shuddered. He couldn’t deny that. He’d been so relieved and thrilled to find Gallifrey restored that he’d allowed himself to be captured and beaten. “You’re right,” he admitted. “It’s just that they’re so…”

“Warm,” the Master supplied, hitting it spot-on. His arms dropped down to the front of the Doctor, hands spreading over his abdomen and rising upward. He got the soap and began bathing his chest slowly, the frictionless glide of wet skin upon wet skin. “They’re warm inside and out, and our people are frozen solid. It’s easy to see why you opt for humans to keep you company, because you’re warm, too. You’re social. You like interacting with others and always have.”

God, the Master knew him, didn’t he? The Doctor couldn’t think anymore, just feel. Doubtless that was the Master’s entire purpose, to reduce him to a vulnerable wreck of nerve endings. The ultimate reason escaped him, but he couldn’t care. This felt so good. One of his own touching him, two hearts at his back, hands that had skill…

Oh, the Master’s clever, clever hands. The Doctor felt himself getting hard.

“Oh, now this is unexpected,” the Master murmured in his ear, dropping a soapy hand down. “Good, Doctor. I’ve cleaned your mind and your skin, so this is a logical step. Aren’t you clever?” He wrapped fingers around the Doctor’s stiffening cock. “Come on… Yes, that’s it. Good boy.”

The Doctor heard a sob leave his throat. His legs moved farther apart on their own. He hadn’t had this kind of personal attention in ages, and the Master seemed to know exactly how to touch him.

“Of course I know how to touch you; I study you, Doctor.” The Master gripped and swirled, thumbing the sensitive flange underneath and making him cry out. The hand bracing his chest found a nipple and began a rolling, careful pinching that made the Doctor see stars. “I’m all about you, don’t you know that? Everything I do and ever have done is about you.” He pumped him, short and shallow to keep him strung like a wire but unspilled. “I know how to touch you, taste you, _fuck_ you; I’ve thought about it for hundreds of years.”

Oh, God. The Doctor let an embarrassing noise pass his lips. He hadn’t known. He hadn’t realized.

“You knew it on the deepest level,” the Master corrected, his hand speeding up just a little. “It’s why you’re always trying to save me from myself.” He moved to toy with his other nipple, a bit rougher now. His lips coasted down the Doctor’s sensitive, newly shaven nape. “You want me as much as I want you. Admit it.”

“I…” The Doctor arched and groaned. The truth in his soul poured forth. “Yes, Master,” he gasped. His entire existence extended only to the body behind him, the hands touching him, the lips speaking against his skin.

“Oh, good, Doctor,” the Master rumbled. “So obedient, so very honest. It’s hard to get anything but lies out of you.” His hold around the Doctor’s cock became reward and punishment at the same time. “But, your body can’t lie, can it? It’s too _hungry_.” He jerked hard and fast, tearing loose the moorings on the Doctor’s control. His teeth struck him under the ear, fast and sharp as a snake, and the Doctor stiffened.

“Master!” The Doctor came, the pressure boiling and erupting. The Master stroked him through it with a vengeance, still biting, covering his neck and shoulder with stinging bright sharpness. He thought he’d die from the pleasure, the rightness, the unspeakable unholy joy of orgasming under his best enemy’s volition. Electric blackness closed in his sight. He couldn’t breathe anymore, couldn’t think, couldn’t…

 

**

 

The Doctor awoke in his own bed, clean and dressed in everything but his shoes. Groggy, he sat up and took inventory of himself. He’d healed. He felt excellent, actually. His neck throbbed a little, but… He got up and looked at himself in the mirror, holding his collar down. The Master’s neat little bites gleamed red. He hadn’t pierced his skin, but only barely.

He looked into his eyes to see conflict and embarrassment. The Master had owned him utterly. He couldn’t even be angry at the manipulation involved, because the Master had only used the truth against him. No coercion. He’d wanted the Master’s hands and mouth.

Where was he? The Doctor sniffed the air. The Master wasn’t on board the TARDIS.

He put his Converse on and slowly made his way into the main control room. The TARDIS was parked on a busy moon base in Gamma Delta Quadrant. There was a note written in Gallifreyan, stuck to the temporal stabilizers.

**I put a randomizer in your trajectory plotters. The Time Lords won’t be able to predict where you go. It’s your trick, so I can’t shout my magnificence; remember how you did the same thing shortly after ditching your third body? Mmm, I liked that one. Didn’t you wonder why I practically shared your exile? Couldn’t get you out into the stars to play, so I had to come to you.**

**See you soon.**

**The Master**

 

The Doctor smiled a little, his hearts beginning to beat faster.

Game on, then.

 

 


	3. Slavery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hard truth is hard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Master is clever.

The Master lifted his scope and looked through it, disbelief going to war with a feeling of I-should-have-known. Yes, that was the Doctor being dragged into the slave enclosure. He’d been robbed of everything but trousers, and his feet were bleeding. A guard pushed him with his lance, hard enough that the Master knew he’d pierced the skin. The Doctor fell and was kicked until he managed to get back up.

Bitter rage made the Master’s mouth twist. He tasted acidic bile and swallowed it back down. He could accept his own people taking exception to the Doctor, and hurting him, but not these ignorant savages. Their combined number of ten billion couldn’t equal one Time Lord, much less the Doctor. Knowing him, he’d probably been trying to help them in some significant way, and they’d been too stupid to comprehend what a gift his attention was.

He checked his pockets, but he knew he didn’t have a weapon. He’d only come here for the beautiful and deadly tunisveall plants. Being a short expedition, he’d neglected his long-time precautions. He could go back up to the ship… No. No, he had only a matter of hours before his employers began insisting upon his return. They’d only come into orbit because of the yellow star, to gather solar fuel on their way to the swampland planet Ker. It would use at least an hour to take the shuttle up and back, and he couldn’t waste that time. There were too many numbers that leaned toward immediate action.

Taking his gaze west, the Master spied large groups of people in evening dress entering a large and sumptuous building. A sign proclaimed SLAVE EVENT. Evidently, the Doctor and his fellow slaves were to be auctioned off.

He took a moment to reflect that life followed certain patterns and that there were worlds within worlds. If he had his way he’d own them all. Still, he was only one man, and nearly always suffered a lack of resources. At this point in his very long life, with another eleven regenerations to burn, he felt universal domination more of a hobby than a burning pursuit. He was tired, actually, and he’d noted similar signs of fatigue in his favorite opponent.

How pleasant he thought it would be to focus all his attention on unraveling the mystery of the Doctor. But, he could hardly do that when the idiot kept getting himself imprisoned, enslaved, and what have you. The Master would have no opportunity to bask in that affable charm, to be lifted up on a wave of fascinated, Doctor-magnetism if the man didn’t stop trying so hard to be a benevolent god. He had absolutely no sense of self-preservation when his moral high ground lifted a notch.

To business, then.

The Master put his collected plants at the shuttle dock, and stuffed his lab coat up around them. His clothes weren’t good enough for the most expedient plan, and he needed funds, so he walked five minutes to the best bank in sight and simply breezed past the clerks as if he belonged there. With his mental repelling field on maximum, no one wanted to even look his way.

He found the vault and examined the lock. It was a six digit coding on a standard numeric pad, two-toned to show part of the code should be in black and part in red. It had a failsafe for continued improper entry. He could figure it out in five minutes, but he didn’t want to waste the time. He found the manager and took control of his mind, getting the safe open about three minutes sooner than if he tried to show off to himself. Once inside, he took ten million jixe, a nice sum on eighteen different planets if one only even considered the metal. He closed the safe, put the manager back to work, and exited the bank approximately six minutes after he’d entered.

Handily enough, a very nice men’s shop sat on the opposite corner of the street. The Master entered and sacrificed fifteen minutes to getting a very expensive suit fitted. He couldn’t skimp on this even if he wanted to; entering a party in style was an intimidation technique he’d perfected. Always use your natural talents.

 

Impeccably dressed, the Master walked a single block to the nearest chemist’s. Hardly any effort on his part and he had the required drugs. He suspected the Doctor’s captors would sedate him, and this planet had a lot of opioids; the chemical counter-doses for which were simple to deduce. He’d also picked up a poison for the large, pesty rodents that tormented the locals.

The Master took public transportation to just outside the auction, preferring to walk rather than show up in a taxi. He’d really liked to have the best transportation, but it wasn’t practical to waste time. This way he could claim to be fashionably viewing the social scene. He’d gotten here well before the crowd even half arrived, to judge by the number of tables in the main hall. All in all, from binocular viewing to entrance, he’d used only forty-one minutes.

He made nice with other party-goers for the requisite fifteen minutes before attracting the attention of a particularly handsome, gay server. He stroked his wineglass with one finger, meeting the man’s surreptitious gaze with an eyebrow of interest. Casually, he rubbed a hand across his stomach, dragging his shirt so the man could see his shape better. He used not a shred of mesmerism to gain a silent and subtle invitation toward the pantries.

“Slumming?” The man asked as he set his drinks tray down on a small table. He’d led the Master to a secluded area.

“You’re better than anything out there,” the Master said honestly. “Why are you serving drinks to these upper class vermin? You should be modeling.”

The server’s pale eyebrows soared upward. “Can’t get into modeling without a portfolio, can’t get a portfolio without a gig, can’t get a gig without a portfolio,” he answered. “How did you know that’s what I want to do?”

“It’s obvious,” the Master told him. And, it was, at least to anyone with half a brain. No one looked this good and didn’t try to make some money off of it. The young man spent hours in a gym, watched what he ate, and carried himself proudly, too. “How much money do you need. Or want?”

The man/boy smiled a little. “I’ve never agreed to this before, so it’ll be high.”

The Master knew he was telling the truth. The sweet young thing was willing to give up his virginity to get out of pouring booze for rich arseholes. That struck a chord in the Master, who well remembered having to claw his way out of unfortunate birth just to get into the academy. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the remaining nine million, seven hundred thousand jixe. “Only tell me which drinks are served to the elite, the funders of this slave market, and I’ll give you this without asking for anything else.”

The man blinked. “You want to know…” His eyes narrowed. “You’re part of the anti-slavery movement, aren’t you? You’re going to poison those bastards.”

“No, actually,” the Master admitted. “My best, most beloved enemy is in there, in the slave pens, and I mean to seize him. The poisoning of the slavers is just something I _want_ to do. I can’t be too terribly freehanded, because if I kill _everyone_ , my quarry will balk. As I’m attempting to seduce him, that would be inconvenient.”

Very slowly, the young man began to smile. “My, he’s a lucky one, your enemy,” he said. “Am I wrong to think he won’t appreciate your romantic gesture?”

“No,” the Master said, answering that smile. “You’re quite right; he’ll rage like a… storm.”

Laughing, the young man threw his head back. “Okay, you odd and frightening man, I’ll help you.” He pushed a curtain back on a door and pointed. “You see that red cask? Only the slave merchants get to drink out of that on pain of death. It’s pure, undiluted Androvian wine, a hundred and fifty cycles old. I estimate it’s half full, because we’ve already had one auction, and they get replaced after the season. Pour your poison in that and you’ll take out everyone with a financial interest in slaves, I promise.”

“Good lad.” The Master handed over the money. “Consider yourself part of the anti-slavery movement.” He wouldn’t ask him to put the rodenticide in, like he’d considered briefly. No, the pleasure would be his.

“Thanks.” The young server picked up his tray and walked to the door. “Hope your very good enemy fulfills _your_ hopes.” With that he joined his fellow workers.

The Master again threw out his mental repelling field, entered the kitchen, and dosed the wine. Smiling, he made his way to the seating intended for special guests, giving the attendant the name James Stoker. His name was found even though not listed, of course, and he soon found himself sitting with a grand view of the proceedings. He ordered the most expensive drink on the menu, single malt imported from Earth, purchased a cigar complimentary to the anticipated drink, and made small talk with an odious wretch close by. The auction would start in three minutes.

“Best opportunity in the world, slaving,” the corpulent businessman exclaimed. “There’s always a people trying to sell off their disadvantaged, or strong muscled, weak headed idiots.” He paused to light his own cigar, an inferior leaf. “I arrange most of these slaves, you know; without me these events couldn’t happen.”

“Indeed.” The Master muttered noncommittally. He could care less.

“What sells is the unusual, the exotic,” the man blathered on, oblivious to the Master’s disinterest. “This sector is mostly full of towheads, so black hair and brown hair are very ‘in’. Redheads bring the most, but they’re very rare.”

“I see.” The Master took a drink of his single malt and shivered pleasantly. Good. As good as he’d demanded on the Valiant.

“Tall ones, now, they’re always a good seller, thin or bulky.” The man puffed his cigar vigorously, hitting his stride. “Dark eyes are the best, of course. Most everyone here has blue or grey eyes. The darker the better on a slave. Makes people think about sex, right?”

The Master thought of his dark haired, dark eyed, tall and lanky enemy. “Sex, you say?” He asked, starting to focus on his repellant companion. He stopped him from having a drink of wine with a quick hand; no one else was drinking yet, and there’d be a celebratory toast to someone before this ostentatious display of short vision and low class got underway. “Wait,” he ordered. He couldn’t have the mouth-breather keel over before time and cause others to not drink.

“Quite right, thank you. I forgot about the first drink.” The merchant smiled broadly. “But yes, sex. Most people wear a lot of dark eyeliner to emphasize they’re looking for it, and dark eyed people just sort of hit a nerve with this lot.” He focused on the Master’s hair and eyes then, and the Master saw him thinking about how much money he’d fetch.

The Master guessed he had less than five minutes until the obligatory party rhetoric and the introduction of the slaves. He smiled a little at the cigar-puffing fool. “Have a good one going on the block, do you? Give me a preview. I might make you richer.”

“A preview?” The merchant gave him a coy look askance. “Are you in the market for a superior slave?”

“Yes, actually. Tell me about your best ones.” The Master sipped his whiskey with pleasure; he’d ask for another one of these before things got serious.

“Well, all right,” the man agreed. “Male or female?”

“Oh, male, definitely,” the Master murmured. “The females are too delicate for me.” He shrugged, managing to condense in that slight shoulder roll that he’d broken a few slaves and enjoyed it.

Eyes brightening, the merchant grinned a sly and oily grin. “Well, I picked up a few yesterday that can take a beating.”

“Really?” The Master strung his word out and up, a polite noise of disbelief.

“Yes, yes, really.” The merchant leaned toward him in a completely unnecessary, conspiratorial fashion, but the Master complied and met him halfway. “You see, I’ve got one that I know might interest you. He won’t go for less than five million jixe.”

“I rather thought I was at a good auction,” the Master said thoughtfully.

“Oh, of course, sir, of course. I only threw that figure out because most people aren’t really serious about owning a quality slave,” the man protested, recovering quickly. “Most people want a housekeeper or driver, or something equally… unimaginative.”

“I don’t buy slaves for menial labor. Menial labor is easily paid for,” the Master said smoothly.

“While a slave is so much more tailored to the individual, like that splendid suit you’re wearing,” the businessman parried. “If you’re able to spend several hundred thousand jixe on a mere suit, you must be very willing to pay for what you want.”

“I doubt you even have what I want,” the Master said, easing back a bit, withdrawing slightly. “I want dark eyes, dark hair, good height, lanky construction and long hands."

“Then you are in luck, my friend. I picked up one this morning to fit that description.” He paused and licked his lips. “Do you, ah, wish to break a slave yourself or have our service do it for you?”

“Oh, you break them for extra?” The Master asked. Inside he was like liquid nitrogen. This one was the one who’d taken the Doctor.

“Of course; some people are too busy.” The merchant chewed his lip as if thinking about something unpleasant. “The one I have that fits your criteria is a little… mouthy. We had to gag him. He simply won’t shut up.”

Inside his anger, the Master felt a flicker of humor. He decided poison was too impersonal for this one. He reached over to flick his cigar ash and accidentally-on-purpose knocked his companion’s glass of wine over. “Oh, pardon,” he said as the liquid splashed all over the floor. “I’ll replace it, of course.”

“Oh, never mind,” the man told him, easily forgiving the loss of the excellent wine for favor of making nice with a man who could make him significantly richer. “These tables are terribly unsturdy; I’m sure it’s the fault of the establishment. Rikkon Three, now, knows how to treat-.”

The man’s tiresome mouth ceased as the auction went underway. A boring, ten minute speech about the glories of free trade made the Master want to seriously doze off, but the thought of watching everyone choke to death made him stay awake. He could have been much more inventive, and it even would have suited him better, but he hadn’t the patience today, and the Doctor hadn’t seemed in good enough condition to draw anything out too long.

Wine was sipped and the slaves came forth. The Master checked the timepiece on the far wall and calculated three minutes, maximum. He sought and found the Doctor standing miserably proud very near the front. He looked woozy, confirming the thought that the slavers would drug their wares in order to get through the event. He saw him lift his head and sniff the air.

Their eyes met just as a hundred and twenty five people began choking to death on tasteless, odorless poison. The Master stood and gave him a whaddaya-gonna-do shrug, grinning. Around him people were scattering in a panic, fleeing the tidal wave of ugly death. The Master knew if he waited but a few moments the room would empty out. He knew just how to spend those few minutes. Casually, he took off his tie and wrapped it around his table companion’s neck.

Personal death always hit him so viscerally. He enjoyed the struggle of it, the brutal, honest drive of predator against prey. The merchant was too feeble to put up much struggle, sadly. He quit resisting in less than thirty seconds. The Master dropped him and looked for his clear spot. All the slaves had scattered, escaped in the confusion, except for one.

The Doctor stared at him accusingly.

“Oh, don’t give me that,” the Master protested, throwing his arms out and descending to the lower platform one smooth step at a time. “If I was born here I’d be a hero amongst the underprivileged, disadvantaged and downtrodden.” He grabbed the chain that held the Doctor’s cuffs together, ignoring the burning, angry glare radiating from his eyes. “Come on, Doctor. I spied your TARDIS on the way here. Let’s go before the local law officers arrive.” He made him walk alongside at his pace, enjoying it.

To the Master’s surprise, and possibly even the Doctor’s, for the man paused a bit, the TARDIS opened herself when they drew near. The Master wasted no time in plotting a short hop to the shuttle stop. He had almost an entire hour before he’d have to go, thankfully.

The Doctor had made a staggery journey up to the main controls. The Master turned and rid him of his gag. He then gave him a jab to rid him of the opiates in his system.

“You just killed over a hundred people!” The Doctor shouted.

“I just liberated twice that,” the Master riposted. He found the primary tool kit and got a laser cutter from it. With one swipe he cut the chain. “Hold your wrists out.”

The Doctor glowered at him, but obeyed. “You didn’t care about liberating anyone. You were showing off.”

“I wasn’t.” The Master got one cuff cut free and slowed down a little for the next; it had a coupling that required a more concentrated beam. “The point was to get you, Doctor. What difference does it make that I chose to slow down the slave trade?”

“You… you weren’t…” The Doctor ground his teeth together. “That was brutal,” he said flatly. “Some of them could have been reformed.”

The Master felt like slapping him. He refrained. “The only difference between us is I don’t mind killing when I have to. You mope about in self-pity and angst afterward, philosophizing and acting like an Old Testament repentant. Only, you repent and keep sinning.” He freed the Doctor and stepped back, true anger taking hold of him. But, he still could hear over the drums. “How about we compromise? You take out the children and I take out the queen?”

The Doctor blanched at the Racnoss reference. They’d never discussed it, not in all that time afterward, even on the Valiant. It was a matter not to discuss, their similarities.

“Go put some clothes on,” the Master ordered. “I have twenty minutes to talk to you.” He didn’t intend to stay at all. As soon as the Doctor went in search of clothes, he’d leave. He’d get on the shuttle and return to the Botany Biolab 400.

The Doctor eyed him a long moment before turning an angry heel and vanishing around a doorway. The Master wrote him a quick note and did exactly as planned. Once aboard, he informed the captain of his return, and the ship left early.

 

**

 

The Doctor knew he’d return to an empty control room. He picked up his note and made his eyes move over it.

**There are two forces in the universe, Doctor. One is life and one is death. Creation and destruction. Yin and Yang. Don’t fight the force you’re nestled up against.**

The Doctor closed his eyes.

 

 


	4. Truce

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A shaky and strange middle ground is born.

The Master enjoyed his work, no doubt of it. He even liked his coworkers, which hardly ever happened. Sometimes he’d liked his minions, his slaves, his canon fodder, but rarely the people he had to actually interact with for a job. He supposed it must be an advantage, having plenty of decent minds focused on your various projects. That lovely and dedicated Jeannea, for example, liked to hover around him for hours and do his fetching. She absorbed everything he said, everything he taught, and forgot nothing.

The Master recognized stifled talent when he saw it. The ship abounded with it. Science expeditions were notoriously under-funded throughout the cosmos, and Botany Biolab was no exception. They labored many hours in the drive for exploring the pairing of plant life, got little recognition or recompense for it, too. Due to his natural genius, the Master had become something of a supervisor, a spokesman for the rest of the team. No one voted him into the position; his abilities and personal magnetism put him there easily.

“Professor Stoker,” Jeannea greeted cheerfully as she came into Greenhouse Seven. “You have incredible stamina. This is where I left you seven hours ago. Still getting the soil just right for the tubers?”

“Yes, Jeannea,” the Master answered, smiling. He accepted the cup of water she offered and gladly drained it. “I think the tubers will be exceptional in the fueling project. Are you still working on the anti-sterilization of genetically altered seeds?”

“Day fifty-six,” she confirmed, smiling at him. She liked him, he knew, but not in a romantic way. No, she liked him because he didn’t call her independent work foolish. A lot of their fellow scientists believed she had better things to be going on with than trying to reverse the damage of political farming. Also, Jeannea preferred men taller than her, and she was exceptionally statuesque. The Master had considered many times how inconvenient it was to nearly always regenerate into a body of smaller stature.

Ah, well; life is what it is.

A shudder went through the ship, causing them to grab onto whatever stable surface proved most available. “Damn it,” Jeannea swore, her long black hair whipping as she tried to orient her balance. “Those monkeys down in engineering had better get that fuel line repaired today!”

“I’m not certain it’s a fuel line error,” the Master mused, grabbing a pot before it could topple over the edge of a work table. “They’re supposed to be converting us entirely to solar power. Perhaps the conversion is causing the issue?”

“They’re all idiots.” Jeannea righted herself and smoothed her lab coat. “Third-rate engineers for our ship! It’s insulting. And, it’s dangerous for our experiments. Yesterday, Michael had a two-week project ruined from this pitching and rolling about.” She picked up their fallen cups and started walking for the door.

The Master smiled a little at Jeannea’s obvious interest in Michael Sorn. The man was seven feet tall in his stocking feet and made everyone look short, even her. “I’m sure you could help him recover his loses, my dear,” he said.

Jeannea chuckled. “Am I that transparent?”

“Yes.” The Master would have indulged in some playful teasing, but at that moment the maximum alert sounded. All the doors slammed shut, sealing them into Greenhouse Seven.

“What the flying fuck?” Jeannea exclaimed. She looked out into the service port, where the ship’s status could be discerned from a diagnostics chart. “A cylinder of Calis gas has broken in Hold Three! There’s poison vapor leaking into the upper levels!”

“We’re safe,” the Master reminded her, using his calmest voice, but he felt more than irritated at the shoddy maintenance going on. This ship carried a lot of his work, a lot of important work, and to have it ruined by the lesser creatures who flew it, rankled. “All the workstations will be isolated just like we are. No one will be gassed to death.”

“No one except maybe the entire piloting crew,” she corrected grimly, pointing. “Their safety cages aren’t dropping. I expect five minutes before they’re overcome. We can’t even help them!”

Even as she spoke, the claxon died. The extractor fans kicked on, sucking the gas out. The Master and Jeannea watched all the red sectors in the map reverting back to green, all systems returning to normal. Then, the ship gave a little shudder, and the Master heard a change in the energy pathways. Someone had just modified the power relays; something he’d been meaning to do just to make life here easier, but hadn’t quite gotten around to yet. “Botany Biolab back on line,” the computer announced quite unnecessarily. Their doors slid open.

“I’ll be a nervous wreck by the time we get to Alpha Alpha,” Jeannea muttered darkly. “We need a dependable ship, a dependable work crew, and what do we get? Monkeys in a flying zoo!” She shot a tired smile at the Master.

The Master chuckled at how she used his own phrase. “Monkeys in a flying menagerie,” he corrected. “Why don’t you go check on Sorn?”

“Going,” she said, slipping out.

The Master continued hand-blending soils, determined to finish this project before going on to investigate what had caused poison gas to leak all over the ship. He suspected faulty electronics and a brief, open flame. The ultra pure air in his area made him slightly light-headed. He caught a familiar scent amongst all the sterile oxygen, and his head snapped up.

There he stood, the Doctor, looking at him from behind a foot of clear aluminum. Hands in his pockets, dark, brooding face on, he considered the Master in the same way that a judge looks at a convicted criminal. Slowly, he backed up and walked for the entrance to the greenhouse.

“I suppose I have you to thank for not being trapped in a pilotless spaceship,” the Master greeted, temped to bash him with his heavy shovel for being so eternally righteous.

“This ship is a floating bomb,” the Doctor said, coming to stand nearly atop him. “Why would you allow it?”

“I’m busy, and these monkeys won’t learn anything if I clean up their messes.” The Master hit a switch and dropped the mixing spikes down into the soil at his feet. “How did you know I was here?”

“I didn’t, not until I caught a whiff of you going through the air ducts. I followed it down.” The Doctor made a show of looking around. “So, botany?”

“I dabble,” the Master said, employing false modesty because the Doctor expected it. “My particular project is in mass producing phosphorus tubers; I’ve already proven their use as a fuel source. Now, I just have to prove they can be grown quickly enough to make it a practical choice.”

The Doctor picked up his work diary and read it in nine seconds. The Master knew he’d done it just to show off his speed reading and superior comprehension. “Mineral depletion seems high,” he said casually.

“That’s what I’m addressing, thank you, Doctor,” the Master said, dipping a test strip into this newest soil blend. “I’m leaning toward using the tubers to leech dangerous minerals from planets that don’t sustain life for that very reason; there are a lot of Sol-class planets barren of life because of too many acidic or too many alkaline minerals.”

“I see.” The Doctor began eying the chart the Master had drawn of previous attempts with perfect soil. “The phosphorus tubers are ignited in a combustion engine, and their resultant gas is easily used as a soft-footprint propellant.” He straightened and grinned at the Master. “A light trotting over light years; don’t take that lightly, do you?”

The Master rolled his eyes, but he felt amused and gratified all at once. The Doctor’s silly jokes were like a touchstone by now. Without them, the Doctor just wouldn’t be the Doctor. “Not that I don’t feel grateful for your timely intervention, Doctor, but I do have work to do,” he said, looking at his test strip and waiting for the Doctor’s instantaneous improvising on why he needed to hang around.

“Oh, well, I haven’t seen you working on anything legitimate in years,” the Doctor protested, not disappointing the Master. “Do you mind if I watch?”

“Naturally not, if you can keep silent for my concentration,” the Master told him, adding a bit more lime to his soil sample, noting the amount in his book, and engaging the mixers again. He knew the Doctor found silence next to impossible.

“Oh, I’ll be quiet,’ the Doctor promised. “Like a mouse. Like a mouse with three legs. Like a three-legged mouse wearing slippers.”

The Master bowed his head and pinched the bridge of his nose to keep from smiling.

“Ah, now, that was a smile,” the Doctor proclaimed in a voice nearly sing-song with glee. “I saw you kill it.” He moved a little closer, just enough to force the Master to pay more attention to him than to his project. The Master realized they both used this sort of manipulation, and concluded the Doctor was actually better at it; he had just the right amount of looming combined with an aura of benevolence so strong that most couldn’t entirely trust it.

Except, the Master knew he _could_ trust that strong benevolence, because the Doctor was a dependable do-gooder. So, the Master was left only with the sensation of having a half-mad god hanging over his every movement. It wasn’t unpleasant at all.

“Why the sudden decorum change?” The Doctor asked quite seriously. “You’ve been channeling your Svengali incarnation since Gallifrey.”

Pleased that the Doctor had noticed, the Master met his eyes. “You know, of course, that all your past lives are still lurking inside you? I’m sure you feel them. Under special circumstances, when your present personality is short-circuited, they probably even speak, correct?”

“Yes,” the Doctor answered mildly. “Are you saying a previous incarnation is working with your current one?”

“You intuit so well.” The Master checked his soil’s acid levels and added just a touch more. “I realized that the drums would take me completely over the edge if I didn’t find a way to at least soften their noise. For lack of control over time itself, which is where my problem comes from, I allowed a previous personality equal time; his drums were barely audible, a mere annoyance.”

The Doctor looked at him with all the focus of a Llhendberg Lens. “You are absolutely the most brilliant thing in the universe,” he said, his tone soft and wondering. “Unstoppable, uncontained, immeasurable genius. I don’t know how you stand yourself.”

Swallowing, the Master affected indifference with a shrug. It _was_ hard to be him. He did like acknowledgment of his intelligence. Coming from the Doctor it felt very nice. But that was rather the worst part. The Doctor could use carrot-and-stick like a pro. It took all his willpower not to succumb to the praise/punch. “You could do it, too,” he protested. “All it takes is allowing part of the current personality to die or to suppress.”

The Doctor nodded. “So, what did you choose?”

The Master shrugged again. “The freedom of my speech patterns; my previous personality enjoys a certain type of eloquence.”

“Which is why you don’t sound quite as casual anymore.” The Doctor tilted his head, true interest showing in his eyes. “How does it feel?”

“Calmer,” the Master admitted. “Focus is easier. Less frenetic energy.”

“Higher sex drive,” the Doctor suggested at a murmur.

“Since you brought it up, yes,” the Master admitted.

“Your first note to me suggested such.” The Doctor’s body remained very still, his eyes absorbing the Master’s every twitch. “And, come to think of it, you _were_ everywhere I turned when I was exiled on Earth.”

“I love playing with you, Doctor.” The Master gave up on continuing his work for awhile. The Doctor seemed hell-bent to investigate some poignant pathways. “In some ways I even enjoy losing to you.”

The Doctor’s eyes half shuttered. His head tilted back. “But you don’t have to lose. You’re smart enough to arrange triumph.”

It distressed the Master to be caught out. He’d rarely given more than seventy percent toward winning any of their skirmishes, because one hundred percent would mean a final victory. A final victory meant not having the Doctor. Not having the Doctor meant languishing in eternal solitude. The Master didn’t like any of that. He capitulated to revealing the truth of that, but cautiously. The Doctor wasn’t domestic, not in the slightest, and even a whisper of the Master’s real feelings would send him packing.

So, he couldn’t blow off the revelation, nor could he be utterly honest about it, which further irritated him. Maybe the Doctor found lies a convenient and interesting pastime, but he didn’t like depending on them. He liked telling the bald, ugly truth and watching everyone squirm in it.

“I’m a capricious man, as you know, Doctor,” the Master said, taking a seat on a work table. “Still, there are constants I depend upon. The main one is you.”

The Doctor didn’t move, didn’t speak, didn’t change expression, but the Master felt him tensing. It was more than subtle; a slight alteration in mental pitch, a quiet change in his artron polarity.

“The reason you’re my main constant, is that you _are_ so utterly consistent,” the Master went on. “Regeneration to regeneration, you’re never anything less than a bleeding wound savior for the universe, a force of compassion and parental mindset.”

“You aren’t telling me you like that, that you need it?” the Doctor protested lightly.

“Of course I do,” the Master chastised, keeping his tone equally mild. “You’re my governor; without your interference I’d have conquered the universe a long time ago and would now sit languishing in having my every desire easily given.”

The Doctor stared at him for a very long time, still unmoving, judging his veracity. “You don’t want to win at all, do you?” he asked quietly. “You want the fight itself.”

The Master smiled and said nothing.

“So, if the fight is the main objective,” the Doctor continued, “why do I feel like the battleground isn’t the only thing that’s changed?”

“You mean, why is the fight one-to-one, now,” the Master said, since he wouldn’t. “You want to know why I’m suddenly rescuing you instead of leaving you to rot.”

“Exactly.” The Doctor put his hands back in his pockets and swallowed. “Why quit trying to kill me now when it served very well for years and years?”

“I need you. It took me awhile to understand that.” The Master in no way expected the Doctor to share his sentiment, or to be on the same page at the same time. However, he did expect to be able to get them there together, eventually. “What a dull universe it would be without you.”

The Master watched, entranced, as the Doctor blushed. He chewed the inside of his mouth, looked at the far wall, and fidgeted, obviously at a loss for what to do. “I, ah, suppose I should be complimented?”

Charming. Absolutely charming. The Master found it amazing and wonderful that the Doctor could do so much, see so much, and remain an innocent. He was what scientists and philosophers called a ‘fixed object’; changing and influencing all those around him without changing himself one jot. That darkness he pushed back, the light he embraced, the utter joy of making people happy… Those were things purely the Doctor. Smart enough to know he harbored a duality within, stubborn enough to resist it most always, and sad that he couldn’t be a complete source of Good.

“You do very well, Doctor,” the Master told him, using his softest, kindest voice. “Do you think a creature like me could resist?”

That quiet question made the Doctor shiver. He pawed his hair nervously and tried to focus on something else, his eyes roaming desperately. But, in the end he seemed to surrender. With taffy slowness, he brought his eyes back to the Master, and the Master easily saw he was thinking about the bath they took together. Thinking about the Master talking to him, jerking him to orgasm while he covered his sensitive neck in bites.

“You resisted so well for so long,” the Doctor said finally. “I did, too. I didn’t know this about us.”

The Master nodded. “I refused to know. I fully expect you to go through that as well.”

“No, you don’t,” the Doctor argued. “Your little philosophical jab about Yin and Yang started me farther back than just now. When I consider it, I have to think about what a calculating, cunning animal you are. You peeled the first layer of resistance off in my second best hot tub.”

Even now the Master could feel the Doctor’s silky, hot, hefty cock in his hand. Every vein and groove. He could feel a hard little nipple between his fingers, puckering more and more as he gently abused it. He heard the Doctor’s reluctant, tortured, disbelieving pants and quiet little cries of shocked pleasure. His chest burned with the memory of the Doctor’s poetic backbone pressed dead center. If the Doctor only knew how difficult it was to maintain control under an onslaught of his beauty… Well, the Master was sure the bastard would use it against him.

Eyes glazing over, the Doctor took two steps closer. He stopped, shook his head and made a strange noise. “Stop trying to hypnotize me,” he said severely.

“I wasn’t,” the Master told him, and honestly. “It isn’t my fault you’re tuned into my psionic wavelengths; that’s your doing. You try to sense me, to find me, and you’re surprised when you succeed?” He shook his head, tsk-tsking. “If only you didn’t take your crusade against me so seriously, you’d have a little defense. I’m quite overpowering at close range.”

The Doctor neatly took the ‘out’ that the Master offered, scowling and striding off. The Master knew he’d go directly to his TARDIS and fly off for a sulk and time alone to ponder their interaction. Returning to the task of mixing soil, the Master forced his hearts to slow and his blood pressure to drop. It took effort, but he succeeded. Nothing affected him like the Doctor. He didn’t know how long he could play this game without capitulating to his primal need of the man.

He smiled as he found the proper mix of minerals, and radioed the cockpit to inform they needed to change their flight plan. He’d test his brilliance out tomorrow, perhaps.


	5. Himeros

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Master is determined.

It was curiosity, nothing more. The Master told himself this over and over as he followed the tour group through the long, dark catacombs. Truthfully, though, he felt terribly frightened he would find the Doctor down here amongst the eternally sleeping citizens of Kronos Twelve. Instinct, his focus upon the man, had pulled him here, but he hoped to prove that wrong.

“No one knows why this ancient civilization simply went to sleep and never awakened,” the cheerful, over-painted guide said, shining her flashlight back and forth over a domestic scene. “They dropped during their meals, during work, during play; whatever virus did this to them is still active, keeping them in eternal hibernation.”

“Like Athaneum and Pompeii, only without death,” a precocious child piped in.

“Exactly,” the tour guide said, smiling a false smile while the child’s proud parents beamed. “Be sure you keep your suit and oxygen supply safe or you’ll end up just like them."

They moved further down. The Master caught a whiff of the Doctor, and cursed. Using his own flashlight, he deviated from the group and followed the enticing scent. Two corridors, three, four, a right turn and a left, and there he was. The Doctor lay slumped across a pile of electronics that the Master knew would save absolutely everyone here. If the Doctor hadn’t succumbed to the virus, of course.

Sighing, the Master pushed him back and had a look at the mess. Oh, he’d almost finished. These antiviral recirculators would force a remedy into even the smallest recesses of these caves. He took the sonic screwdriver out of the Doctor’s limp hand and went about finishing. He hoped the cure worked for Time Lords as well as ancient Kronosians.

Twenty minutes later, the Master switched on the device and put the sonic back into the Doctor’s hand. He waited until the man started showing signs of life, then simply left. It did no good to wait around for his kudos. He knew that from previous experience.

“Did you miss me?” He asked his TARDIS. The machine throbbed cautiously. They had too new of a relationship to have connected, but she was willing to know him, at least. He set his coordinates for the nearest pleasure planet, determined to take his sexual frustration out on a feelingless droid, a thing who wouldn’t condemn him for being what he was and who wouldn’t laugh that the self-proclaimed dominator of the universe liked soft caresses and slow fucking.

 

**

 

“Not again,” the Master whispered fiercely, catching sight of the Doctor among the drugged. He’d chained himself to a radiator to avoid giving in to the gang bang, and had severely wounded himself in order to preserve his precious chastity.

“You know him?” The med-tech asked, setting up the antidote canisters in the air supply. “Looks like he’s got nothing to be ashamed of, at least.”

“Yes, that rather sums him up,” the Master said. “A life of continual privation, and moralistic servitude to the forces of creation.” He bent and examined the Doctor’s bloody wrist. His healing had kicked in to stop the blood loss, but at a cost. The metal cuff was fused under the skin now, and any effort to remove it would cause horrible pain.

Taking out his laser, the Master severed the chain from the radiator. Musing on having the Doctor handcuffed, he lifted him up onto his shoulder and walked out with him. He had no idea where the Doctor’s TARDIS might be, and despaired. He didn’t want the Doctor knowing he had his own time machine now. A faraway spot of blue caught his eyes. Relieved, he simply carried the Doctor nearly a mile to the hill’s summit.

The TARDIS let him in without any fuss. The Master carried the Doctor directly to a sickbay and flopped his gangly burden onto a diagnostic cot. Contusions, lacerations, bone bruising… Ouch. The Master gave him a heavy painkiller and went to work removing the cuff.

The Doctor’s blood hit the floor in steady, heavy drops as the Master cut skin away from metal. He had to be very careful not to sever a main artery, as the Doctor’s body had rerouted things to get around the metal. He worked very slowly, allowing the natural reconfiguration while keeping the bleeding to a minimum. He didn’t allow himself to think about anything but doing this perfectly, leaving the Doctor without any lingering ill effects other than soreness.

The Doctor started coming around as the Master wrapped his wrist, so there would be no anonymous escape this time. Resigned, the Master merely continued. “Oh,” the Doctor slurred. “Did you save me? Thanks for saving me.” He lurched upright, forcing the Master to stop winding gauze and catch him from falling onto the floor. “I don’t feel so good. Head’s kinda… swimmy. Is that a word, swimmy?”

The Master couldn’t feel angry. He knew what the Doctor was. Still, he felt frustrated. The man hadn’t figured out what they were to each other, hadn’t picked up on some very major clues as to their biological connection. Because of that, he wouldn’t know why the Master continually had to show up and sort his mess. It was like being an indentured servant to one’s own twin. “It’s a word now if it wasn’t before. I understand what you mean, Doctor.” He braced the boneless, slumping Doctor with his shoulder and hurriedly finished bandaging his wrist.

“Ooh, you smell good,” the Doctor announced, audibly sniffing.

“That’s the remains of the aphrodisiac gas, the painkiller I gave you, and your sensitivity to my personal artron,” the Master lectured. He got him vertical and made him put an arm around his shoulders. “Come on. Bathroom.”

“Don’t want a bath,” the Doctor complained, but he let the Master guide him into the nearest loo. “Taking a bath with you means I feel funny for months.”

The Master smirked at the confession, sitting the Doctor down on the closed toilet. “Funny?” He asked leadingly.

“Confused,” the Doctor clarified.

“Ah.” The Master wet a flannel under some warm water and began cleaning the Doctor’s face. He paused at noticing the man’s blood all over his hands, cursed, and washed up a little himself, first. “It’s confusing that I can make you feel good?”

“It’s confusing that you _would_ ,” the Doctor said, clutching onto a towel rack for support when his back muscles tried to give out. “I think… I think my back is trying to leave me.”

“You were slumped over like a rag doll, unconscious, for three days,” the Master informed. “Of course your back hurts. Once the painkiller wears off you’ll be in serious discomfort.” He cleaned the Doctor’s face, then his arm. “Do you have to relieve yourself?”

The Doctor frowned thoughtfully. “Yes, actually.”

“Fine.” The Master helped him get up, opened the lid of the toilet and braced him.

The Doctor fumbled with his trousers forever, but finally freed himself for a marathon whiz. Pointedly not looking, the Master felt himself smiling at the Doctor’s strong bladder. He jerked to attention as the Doctor lost his balance, and quickly kept him upright. The Doctor managed to tuck away. “Done,” he announced.

“Good. Time for bed, Doctor.” The Master led him to the first bedroom, which indeed proved to be the Doctor’s main flop. It was wreck of clothes, papers and electronics, projects in every stage of completion. The Master kicked a path to the bed and put the Doctor on it, kneeling to take his ridiculous Converses off.

The man had beautiful feet. The Master looked at them, admiring his high arches and strong but long toes. On impulse, he lightly pinched the littlest one on his left foot and wriggled it. The Doctor fell backward, giving a single, breathless giggle. He was ticklish.

Warm fondness welled up within the Master. He got up and straddled the Doctor to start removing his jacket. He only got so far before he had to tug the Doctor upward. Easing an arm around the middle of his back, he managed to get the Doctor’s mile-long arms worked out of the garment. Managing to get the undershirt off, too, he lowered him back down. The trousers were easier; he removed those quicker, leaving the Doctor in his shorts.

“Roll over,” he ordered, helping him to obey. He looked at that elegant backbone and sharp shoulder blades, the tight muscle that jerked in spasms. The Doctor had really done a number to himself this time; the Master doubted he’d be in shape to hare off for adventures for a few days. Still, he could alleviate some of his pain right now, enough for sleep. The Master spread his hands out and began massaging the Doctor’s back.

“Ohhh, God,” the Doctor gasped. “That’s… that’s wonderful.”

“Isn’t it? Why do you think I had anyone competent working on my back on the Valiant?” The Master leaned on the Doctor’s latissimus dorsi, using hard pressure to force the muscles into stillness. He felt them jerking and rippling, stubbornly wanting to move, and shoved down harder, dragging the pressure in the opposite direction to the natural tremors. “I wasn’t soliciting just to make Lucy jealous.”

“Your poor wife,” the Doctor began, but the Master shut him down.

“Your poor companions,” he countered. “Don’t lecture me about resources.” He redoubled his efforts, forcing the Doctor’s back to submit. “You have the moral high ground nearly everywhere else, but not there, Doctor.”

The Doctor went silent and stayed that way except for the occasional groan. The Master thought he was making an attempt at silence, actually, and that he just couldn’t help the groans. In less than an hour he’d turned the Doctor into putty, putty that fell into a natural sleep. The Master moved off of him and started to just leave, but he couldn’t. Slowly, he turned back to look at his best enemy and biggest weakness.

The Doctor looked like a child, an innocent, sleeping child. Rumpled hair and slack facial muscles, arms askew… His very adult body, however, threw such a contrast. The man was nothing but contradiction anyway, but that foreknowledge didn’t detract from a conflicting tableau. The Master wanted to crawl in bed with him, gather him up against his body, and just sleep. Sleep like he’d never been allowed to sleep. Sleep with the Doctor’s seductive, mad scent in his nostrils. Just rest, finally.

Oh, it was more than appealing. The temptation threatened to overpower him in one, big wave of sheer want. But, the Master knew just as the Doctor feared domestication, the Doctor would also attempt to tame him. To make him docile. Put a collar around his neck. The Doctor had limited vision, and thought that he could tear the Master down and rebuild him into something safe. And, he’d try. Oh, he’d try.

The Master would not be tamed.

He left before he could do something foolish. Going back to his own TARDIS and quickly plotting a new course. Had to get away before the Doctor came to his right mind. Had to escape his best, most alluring adversary before he allowed that collar to snap around his neck.

 

 


	6. Infiltration

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> History is made second to second.

The Master didn’t like bars and pubs and watering holes. Places where any life-forms gather to intoxicate themselves tended to smell bad. Too, no one had any sense once plastered up to the gills. He accepted another shot of whiskey and turned his wandering attention back to his informant. Oh, he didn’t know he was an informant, naturally. Officer Kedro, recently promoted, agent of the Shadow Proclamation, would be appalled to know he was spilling agency secrets to the Master of All Matter.

“D’ja know the Time Lords made a victorious comeback?” Kedro asked, hiccuping loudly and trying to get his beer hoisted once more. “Yep. Broke the lock on the Time War with the help of K’anpo Rimpoche. Word is, the old hermit had the solution for taking care of all the degradations and Daleks, too. Hope they gave that old man a medal.”

The Time Lords had not given Rimpoche a medal, but locked him up for exhibiting powers beyond what a Time Lord should have. The Master should know; he’d been incarcerated close to the hermit. Of course the man got away. Anyone who could project into their own time stream could hardly be daunted by a cage.

“Then, there’s the Doctor,” Kedro said, instantly gaining all of the Master’s capricious attention. “He’s the biggest escape artist of all time. I wonder how long they’ll have him this go-round?”

“Have him?” The Master asked with forced calm.

“Yeah, they got him again. He supposedly went back to Gallifrey to stop an assassination attempt on Chancellor Flavia.” Kedro belched loudly and ordered another beer. Taking up a handful of very salty peanuts, the officer began chomping while he talked. “I hear he succeeded, but that Flavia’s in some sort of coma, and the High Council blames the Doctor for it even though it was their own guards that tried to kill her.” He shook his head and looked at the table top a moment. “I’ve never known a race so screwed in priorities as Gallifreyans.”

“Oh, surely humans are worse,” the Master said leadingly.

“Well, most likely,” Kedro admitted. “But they’re a new race compared to almighty Time Lords, aren’t they?”

“Most assuredly,” the Master agreed. “I have to think that even humans wouldn’t execute someone who saved the life of an important governmental fixture.”

“Nah, they didn’t kill the Doctor; that’d be stupid. He’s notoriously amoral and dangerous when newly regenerated.” Kedro grinned a little. “They just locked him up in Rassilon’s Black Tower. I think he’s been there three weeks now. Well, three standard weeks.”

The Master ordered another round while he thought. If the Capitol guards had made an attempt on Flavia’s life, someone had ordered them to do it; they didn’t act independently. He’d bet good money the Lord High President tried to take Flavia out. The man who had given him his drums. The man he fully intended to slay in cold blood at first opportunity.

Rassilon’s Black Tower was far from impregnable. He’d had an easy time getting in even with Cybermen annoying him every step of the way. Still, if they meant to actually imprison anyone there, the council would have reinforced it. He could bet they’d arranged a series of force fields, physical barriers, and maybe even leg irons.

“I think the Doctor does more good than harm,” Kedro blathered on. “I like the renegades these Time Lords occasionally throw out; most of the others are non-doing, pacifistic thumb-twiddlers. I’d take that hot Rani over any chick, any day.”

“You do know she’s genetically both male and female, like all Time Lords,” the Master murmured. “They get one or the other each regeneration, but essentially they aren’t any one sex.”

“Oh, yeah, I heard that,” Kedro replied airily, waving a hand in dismissal. “But you have to admit, she’s stacked. Got a body that won’t quit and a face that launched a thousand ships.”

The Master smiled to himself. Ushas wouldn’t care one jot to hear this idiot’s opinion over her physical attributes. She’d throw him into a cage for experimentation without an eye blink.

“The Master, now, he’s different,” Kedro said, finishing his beer.

“Oh?” The Master couldn’t wait to hear this idiot’s opinion on himself. “How is he different?”

“Oh, well, he’s a megalomaniac,” Kedro told him. “Seems to treat people with indifference until they piss in his cereal, then ‘Goodnight Vienna’.” He crunched another handful of peanuts and gave the Master a knowing look. “Hasn’t everyone wanted to be like him at one point or another? It gets damned hard to be good, doesn’t it? Sometimes I really just want to beat up my prisoners; especially the ones I know are guilty and are going to get off on some legal loophole.” He shook his head, looking down-spirited. “It’s worse when they know it, because they taunt you. I guarantee they wouldn’t taunt the Master. He’d use his TCE on them and put ‘em in a doll house.”

The Master’s lips twitched. “How do you know so much about him?”

“Oh, I’m supposed to read up on known repeat offenders,” Kedro answered, heaving a big sigh. “Sort of useless to keep files on Time Lord renegades, though, right? They change bodies like people change underwear.”

“Indeed.” The Master finished his third whiskey. “You have to go by the last physical description.”

“Yeah.” Kedro belched again and sat back. “The Master doesn’t change like the Doctor does, though. He’s always so suave and elegant looking. Except for that last one. Between me and you, his last regeneration is pretty hot. I’d do him, if he wouldn’t gut me afterward.”

The Master grinned into his fourth glass. Kedro had beer goggles on, apparently, if he thought so much of this body and couldn’t recognize it. “You’re a randy little buck, aren’t you?”

“Guy like me doesn’t get much action. Hard to be ugly.” Kedro’s mouth turned down.

The Master gave him another look. The man wasn’t the worst he’d seen. If he’d clean up his manners and assume an air of confidence he’d probably have all the tail he wanted, male or female. He made eye contact with him. “You aren’t ugly,” he said, projecting his will upon the agent. “You’re different. You do things your own way and are clever enough to pull that off. Go ahead and punish your prisoners if you feel like it, but cautiously. Use your intelligence to the maximum. You’re just as suave as the Master, Agent Kedro. Time to show everyone that.” The Master blinked and let him go.

Kedro sat quietly as his brain assimilated the hypnotic suggestion. Slowly, he picked up a single peanut and looked at it before dropping it back into the bowl. His back straightened. He smoothed a few wrinkles out of his rumpled tie. His eyes went to the Master. “Thanks for listening to me, mate,” he said, using his manners.

“Not at all,” the Master said smoothly, getting to his feet. “Enjoy your beer.”

He left him and went directly for his TARDIS.

 

**

 

The Master found the Doctor’s TARDIS easily enough; his unimaginative kin had put it exactly where they always put it, the impound lot. He waited until everyone went out for a late lunch, then materialized his own TARDIS around it. It would cause a panicked uproar to have it vanish, so he changed another TARDIS to look like a police box. That would give him time to rescue the Doctor.

The Death Zone lacked in ambiance. The Master remembered very well how he’d hated dodging death rays in this blasted landscape. He set his TARDIS down outside the tower instead of in it, fancying the challenge of a few traps. Any opportunity to show up the Time Lords, he’d take.

Without encountering any ego-bolstering traps, the Master found his counterpart sleeping peacefully on Rassilon’s funereal bier. He’d not been chained to it, as far as the Master could see. He wondered what exactly was supposed to be keeping the Doctor in the tower.

“Forced hibernation,” a voice said from above. The Master looked up to see the disembodied head of Rassilon floating high over his position. “I could awaken him, of course, but I think this is the first peaceful sleep he’s had in centuries. I didn’t see a need to immediately prod him to life.”

The Master sat on a rune stone and thought about that. The Doctor, always busily tearing back and forth, probably did need to rest. “The Time Lords will come and remove him when they feel they’ve enough of a case against him,” he pointed out.

“I only let you in because of how you feel about him,” Rassilon said, smiling.

“Then, my rescue wasn’t necessary,” the Master said, feeling a little disappointed.

“Oh, don’t look at it like that,” Rassilon told him, still smiling. “Even now he’s dreaming of how you’ll rescue him. You’ve been so reliable for that, after all. He’s starting to think you actually care."

“Of course I care,” the Master protested, scowling at the ghostly figure of countless stories. “He belongs not to the Time Lords, not the simple races he attempts to save, not to his human companions, but to me. The Doctor is _mine_. He always has been and always will be.”

“Then, the reverse must be true,” Rassilon observed.

The Master knew that for the truth. The unfortunate truth. “He has no idea,” he said.

“Tell him.”

“He never listens to a word I say.”

“That can’t be so.” Rassilon floated over the Doctor and looked down at him. “Besides, you’re expecting a lot out of him; all your lives you’ve had antagonistic dealings with each other, except for your childhood, which was good indeed. I can see his memories of you.”

“Even if I told him the impossible truth, he wouldn’t believe me.” The Master shook his head and smiled. “No, I have to content myself with watching over him. He needs a keeper.” He looked down at the peaceful face of the Doctor, feeling his guts twist. “It’s his birthday tomorrow,” he said. “I’ll park his TARDIS in here. Consider waking him up for that."

“Goodbye, Master,” Rassilon said simply.

 

**

 

“I’m no expert, but I should still be asleep,” the Doctor said to the ceiling, prompting Rassilon to appear.

“It’s your birthday,” Rassilon said, winking.

“How do you know that? _**I**_ can’t remember my birthday!” The Doctor sat up and instantly spied his TARDIS. “Oh, now there’s a beautiful birthday present.” He hopped down and grinned. “Thank you.”

“Oh, it wasn’t me.” Rassilon floated over to the TARDIS and eyed it with mild interest. “The Master brought it here for you. He’s gone now. Didn’t even hesitate to leave the planet, which is odd because I can feel his burning desire for revenge upon the man who stole all my inventions.”

“The president has your crown, ring, and glove,” the Doctor said softly. The Master had saved him yet again.

“I’d appreciate their return, when you can manage it,” Rassilon said. “If you’re too far behind the Master, you’ll be taking my possessions off the president’s corpse."

The Doctor found he couldn’t care if the Master murdered the man who’d destroyed his life.

“Oh, so you can agree upon some things.” Rassilon smiled at him.

“He ruined the Master,” the Doctor said, face feeling like carved stone. “Took a brilliant little boy and made him insane.”

“He seemed fairly together,” Rassilon argued mildly.

“He’s channeling an earlier personality; says it makes the drums less loud.” The Doctor rubbed his eyes. He hadn’t wanted to miss the Master.

He said his goodbyes, promised to look into getting the relics of Rassilon, and went inside his TARDIS. Without knowing it he was looking for a note, and he found one.

**You make a better Sleeping Beauty than I make a handsome prince. Otherwise, I might’ve found the nerve to plant a big kiss on you.**

 

The Doctor added this note to the two others and plotted course for Rigel Nine, feeling like he’d missed an opportunity.


	7. Obligation

The Master coughed a little as he waited. The clouds and clouds of burning grass smoke made visibility poor, but felt determined to stay where he’d be seen, and the Doctor could hardly miss him while he sat in the center of a burning field. It hadn’t taken long to burn Theta Sigma like a Nazca sigil.

The TARDIS materialized approximately sixteen seconds after the Master had sat. The Doctor came out, and, hands in his pockets, he casually strolled up the small hill. The Master took one look at him and knew he’d recently had something entirely unpleasant happen, or maybe even caused to happen. His eyes were dark like starless space and just as vast.

“You rang?” The Doctor asked, just the hint of a smile on his face. “I do have a phone, you know.”

“You ignore a ringing phone when it suits,” the Master said, getting up and dusting off. “You really look like your Dalek press right now. What did you do?"

“Nothing.” The Doctor looked around demonstratively. “How did you get here?”

“Nothing,” the Master answered.

Sighing, the Doctor rubbed at his already wild hair. “Look, I don’t want to talk about it, because talking about it makes it true, and I don’t want it to be true. I want to lie to myself today. Maybe tomorrow as well.”

“You know, Doctor, there’s a price when a Time Lord throws non-involvement into the rubbish.”

“Yeah, it’s called responsibility.” The Doctor tilted his head to one side and met his eyes again. “So, why is my school name burning a quadrotriticale field in thirty foot letters?”

“I needed a house call.” The Master gestured to himself. “I’m sick."

The Doctor focused on him afresh. “What are your symptoms?” He came closer, taking a stethoscope out of his inner pocket.

“Muscle pain, light sensitivity, headache, nausea, dizziness,” the Master listed. “Loss of appetite, fever, chills, sleeplessness.”

“When did all this start?” The Doctor listened to one heart, eyes to one side as he concentrated. He moved to the other and nodded. Next, he reached for the Master’s wrist.

“About twelve hours ago.” The Master thought there probably wasn’t anything more torturous than the Doctor’s willing but impersonal touch.

“Sounds like a flu,” the Doctor murmured. “Come to the TARDIS with me and I’ll put you on the diagnostic scanner.”

“And end up your prisoner?” The Master asked. “I’m the biggest responsibility you have. I’m not an idiot.”

 

“You aren’t my responsibility,” the Doctor told him. “We’re not the last ones anymore. Besides, if I lock you up, who will save me from myself?”

The Master’s eyelids half lowered in pleasure at the acknowledgment. “There’s no stopping a storm, though, dear Doctor. I know better. I think I fear Daleks more than any other of the nasty races, but they’re actually afraid of _you_. How do you feel about that?”

“Good,” the Doctor answered immediately. “I do my best to eliminate them. They haven’t a strand of kindness or compassion in their mutated little bodies.”

“A race that doesn’t know what fear is, and they fear you,” the Master reiterated.

The Doctor’s long body gave in to a slight, bending lean. “The only reason I’d try to take you into my TARDIS against your will is if you showed me you were about to harm yourself."

Smiling, the Master considered how best to interpret that statement, and pondered just how many ways the Doctor could fulfill that stipulation on the sly.

The Doctor watched him think. “I’ve never seen you like this,” he said. “I’ve seen you calm and deadly, unhinged and deadly, but never this _aware_. This is the first Master I’m looking at. Yet, there’s more; even that version of you had frenetic energy when pushed.” He shook his head, looking at the Master in undisguised wonder. “Will you use this previous version of yourself the next time you regenerate?”

“It seems to be the only thing that helps control the drums,” the Master admitted. “Who knows? I might revert to him entirely when that unlamented day comes to pass.”

“Don’t say- why would it be unlamented?” The Doctor demanded, looking angry.

“Need I point out, Doctor, that you’re the only one who’d care?” The Master replied. “And quite rightly, too. At this point even your levels of compassion and benevolence should be challenged by the sight of me.”

The Doctor looked at him quietly for nearly an entire minute. “Then why am I always ridiculously pleased to see you’re still alive?”

 

The Master’s hearts beat out of rhythm for whole seconds, upsetting their aligned cadence with his mental drums. “Because you think there’s something in me worth saving,” he told him. “Because you’d like to be the one who saves me. And, because I remind you that not every Time Lord is a stuffy prick who wouldn’t bend to tie his shoelaces for fear of getting _involved_ with his shoe.”

The Doctor’s swift, highly amused grin was nothing but natural and joyous. “You’re a very bad man,” he said. “That’s true. And I _would_ like to save you. Still, you look like you’re doing all right on that by yourself lately.”

“Just for that I’ll walk into your TARDIS with you,” the Master told him, pleased he’d managed to set the Doctor into one of his more natural, affable moods.

The Master found it oddly easy to walk alongside the Doctor. One wouldn’t think it, not with all the bad water under their bridges. Still, the Doctor projected, no, _radiated_ , a vibe of gentleness that the Master longed to simply bask in, and this was as close as he could get to basking. What he’d really enjoy was sunning himself like a lizard in the Doctor’s sunshine

“Your TARDIS smells different. You’ve been cleaning.” The Master actually saw some high points of metal gleaming in the low, odd light. “Your fifth self spent hours polishing and tidying up. Maybe I’m not the only one channeling a past identity.”

“I liked being him,” the Doctor said, throwing his brown coat over a railing. “He felt natural. Well, so did Four and Three. And Seven; but he held Six’s lingering darkness a little too well. You might say he refined it.” The Doctor held his arm out, gesturing to the nearest hallway. “Medical bay is six doors down on the left, as you well know.”

“Cleaned up the puddle of blood, did you?” The Master asked rhetorically, proceeding as he was prompted. “Was it that important to preserve your chastity? No one would have faulted you for joining that little gang bang.”

“Maybe I’m saving myself,” the Doctor replied. “I think it’s dangerous to have sex with people you don’t know. Also, there’s the little matter of a paternity enforcement.”

“Heavens forbid,” the Master said in his driest tone. “The universe could always use a few more half-breed Time Lords.”

“Oh, don’t remind me,” the Doctor shot back, sounding irritated. “I was out of my mind, had been dead too long. I didn’t know _what_ I was saying to Grace Holloway. You weren’t at top form, either.”

“Ectoplasmic goo isn’t my best look.” The Master sat on a diagnostic table and removed his jacket and shirt. “Five was your favorite, really?”

“My favorite is always my current self,” the Doctor told him, and being quite sensible, too. “But Five had a lot of energy, optimism, and precision.” He turned on the scanner and looked at the Master’s readings, his eyes glazing a bit as he took in all the information in seconds. “Oh, it’s flu all right,” he muttered. “Have you been in post-industrialist Russia lately?”

“Investigating the origins of my school nickname,” the Master confirmed. “And yes, I do have a TARDIS.

“Then why not have a look at yourself on your own scanners?” The Doctor didn’t appear at all shaken by the information that the Master had a fence-less run throughout all time and space, just irritated he hadn’t been needed as much as he might have thought.

“I’m not a doctor,” the Master reminded. “Oh, I could figure out what the readings meant, but you’re more convenient and competent. Besides, I wanted to see you.”

“Did you?” The Doctor wrote something down on a data pad, his fingers gripping the stylus with a bit too much pressure. “You saw me three weeks ago, in the Black Tower.”

“Belated birthday felicitations,” the Master said.

“And that’s another thing. I can’t remember my own birthday.”

“It’s the day I claim it is,” the Master told him serenely. “I wouldn’t forget your birthday.”

“But, _**I**_ did,” the Doctor persisted, as if his own memory was beyond reproach.

“You don’t want to remember it,” the Master said.

“Fine, I’ll drop it,” the Doctor relented. “How did you get my TARDIS into the Black Tower?”

“Put my own around it. I made another impounded TARDIS look like yours so no one would notice.” The Master tried to see what the Doctor was writing, and failed. “You’re very chummy with Rassilon. Why not get his help in deposing the president?”

“He’s limited to the tower. Exiled, if you like.” The Doctor went to a cabinet, opened it, and got out a bottle and a disposable spoon. “What do you mean you were investigating the origins of your school name? I thought you chose it yourself.”

“Ushas gave me that nickname, actually. I’d refused to pick one, so she did it for me; I think it just irritated her to get my attention with vigorous hand waving.” The Master smiled a little. “Hear anything about her lately?”

“No, not a thing.” The Doctor poured red liquid into the plastic spoon. “Open.”

The Master obediently opened his mouth and got a foul, fake raspberry flavored liquid poured down his throat. It left a trail of vaporous fire, and he stopped gagging only by supreme willpower. “Disgusting.” He shivered violently.

 

“Most medicine is, at least the stuff that works.” The Doctor looked at his bottle. “Oh, good. I thought by your reaction it might have expired.”

“Christ. You’re supposed to check that before you dose your patient.”

“Who’s the doctor here?” The Doctor grinned at him. “I’m only teasing. You ought to feel loads better in an hour. Want a cup of tea to wash it down?”

“Please.” The Master put his shirt and jacket back on and stood, still shivering. “What was that nasty goop, anyway?”

“Flu remedy, of course,” the Doctor grinned.

 

**

 

The Master watched his host wander the small kitchen, amused by the Doctor’s endearing little mannerisms. There were a few things he held onto regeneration after regeneration, such as muttering. The Master thought it might be impossible for the Doctor to actually shut up, at least for longer than a minute or two.

“Still no companion,” the Master observed.

“I keep running into you, and you’re dangerous for any companion,” the Doctor told him in the most no-nonsense tone, warming the teapot with a splash of boiling water. “Besides, I’m more dangerous to them than you are.”

“But you hate being alone,” the Master observed. “You hate it so much you let the Time Lords grab you and keep you incarcerated with daily beatings rather than endure loneliness.”

“I thought I deserved what I got.” The Doctor poured and added the tea leaves, then capped the pot to let the brew steep.

“Yet, you let me take you from prison,” the Master argued.

“There wasn’t much ‘letting’ involved; you manhandled me out of there.”

“As in many instances, I needed you,” the Master replied.

The Doctor sat and looked at him from over top the tea service, his dark eyes radiating his intelligence and skepticism. “All right,” he announced. “I give up. What’s your game?”

Smiling, the Master checked the tea and played ‘mother’. “I don’t have any harmful goals at present, not even where you’re concerned, Doctor. For the first time in a very long time, I can think properly. I can do what I want without an ungodly cacophony in my head. Oh, the drums are still there, but not very loud.” He added a cube of sugar to his portion of tea, then put three in the Doctor’s cup. “By the time I became Professor Yana, the drums were all I could hear. You were fortunate to get as mild a version of me as you did, because I wanted blood so badly I could taste it.”

The Doctor’s eyes turned sad, darkening even further and threatening to absorb him. “What the Time Lords did to you was unforgivable,” he whispered. “Look at how brilliant you are when the drums aren’t tormenting you. Actually, you were brilliant even with that racket in your head. I’m so sorry I didn’t listen to you, try to help you on the Valiant.”

The Master mentally stretched out in the Doctor’s unrelenting culpability before reluctantly letting go of it; the Doctor wasn’t to blame for any of his circumstances. “I didn’t know they were real then, either,” he pointed out. “It’s like the old analogy of a frog in a pot of water. Turn the heat up gradually enough and the frog boils without trying to escape.”

The Doctor winced and stirred his tea to dissolve the sugar. “So, tell me again there’s no harmful game involved,” he asked.

“There’s no harmful game involved.” The Master tried his drink and sighed in pleasure. “Speaking of the Valiant, I should have made you make the tea.”

“Francine means well,” the Doctor protested.

“She’s English and she can’t brew tea,” the Master argued without heat. “Isn’t that a crime of some sort?”

The Doctor grinned into his cup. “Probably,” he admitted.

The Master felt a surge in his healing abilities and gave a grimace of discomfort. “I can feel the anti-viral killing the germs in my system. What _was_ that stuff?”

“Does it matter?” The Doctor persisted in keeping his medicine a secret. “You _are_ feeling better?”

“Yes.” The Master finished his tea. He’d love to sit with the Doctor and talk to him until his voice gave out. Factually, he’d love to just stay with him. Not the proper time, though. The Doctor wasn’t ready to deal with him ever and always, not yet. He might not be ready in a century. But that was fine. The Master knew how to be patient. He got up and put his dirty cup on the counter top. “Thank you for the remedy, Doctor.”

“Leaving so soon?” The disappointment in the Doctor’s voice made the Master’s resolve wobble dangerously.

“I have to. I’m teaching a botany course on Altair Two, and I haven’t collected the proper teaching aids from the swamps of Venedous yet.” The Master made himself look into those beautiful brown eyes. “I have more obligations than you, though you are the most pleasant one.”

The Doctor’s neck turned pink, ever so slightly. He played with his spoon and didn’t get up. “I’m an obligation,” he said, not sounding entirely pleased by that.

“Look up the synonyms for that word before you start feeling hurt.” The Master leaned over him, careful to put exactly the proper amount of personal space invasion and distance into his looming. “Look up at me, will you? Stop playing with that infernal spoon.”

The instant the Doctor complied, the Master swooped down and fastened their mouths. The sharp, violent jolt of lust that sparked at their lips made him clench his hands into fists. He instantly got hard. The Doctor tasted exactly as he smelled, superior. Burning stars and winter forest fires, oudh and passion and willpower. With maximum effort he didn’t stab his tongue into the Doctor’s mouth; that would be too much for his near-virginal, time-honored force of Yin.

He broke from the Doctor and put his lips right at his ear. “See you around, Sleeping Beauty,” he bade, and with that he escaped the kitchen and all the forces that screamed for him to just give up and stay.

 

**

 

The Doctor cleaned up the tea mess, utterly distracted and clumsy and off balance. He picked up the Master’s teacup and put his mouth to the rim of it, tasting. There, in the mix of Darjeeling and cane sugar was the man’s flavor, and it was just as incredible the second time. It jolted him, the way the Master tasted. Utter, joyous madness, power and intelligence and life, musk and rain-soaked wind, leather and Havana cigars and civit. Not a trace of the horrible medicine he’d been forced to take.

“What are you up to?” The Doctor wondered aloud. “Saving me, not trying to kill or humiliate me. Teaching botany classes, for Rassilon’s sake!”

His only response was the quiet hum of his TARDIS, and the tableau of sugar cubes spelling out KOSCHEI on the Master’s side of the table.

He decided to leave them there a few days.

No special reason.

None at all.

 

 


	8. Infatuation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They're a bit fruity.

The Master had never heard his phone ring, so the sound more than startled him. He dropped the spanner and cracked his head on the underside of the consol, letting a blue streak of curses escape his lips. He crawled out and made a series of blind, random grabs until managing to get the handset. This had better be a legitimate call. “Hello?”

“Oh. Er, hello,” the Doctor greeted, clearing his throat nervously. “Your number is unlisted.”

Amused, the Master slouched on the controls and rubbed his sore head. “Yesssss,” he said, drawing it out.

“I used a lot of different combinations,” the Doctor announced, probably fishing for a compliment to his cleverness.

“Oh, indeed?” The Master quietly put a lock on the Doctor’s call to get both his phone number and his exact current position. “Let me guess. You don’t remember the last eleven digit code you tried.”

“Erm, ah, yeaahhh,” the Doctor drawled his confession. The Master easily pictured his sheepish smile and a bit of hand-combing his wild hair.

“Ten zero, eleven-zero-zero, zero-two, nine, nine,” the Master told him.

“Why end that with two nines?” the Doctor asked, having naturally made note of the Master using Gallifrey’s coordinates for his phone number.

The Master chuckled. “Oh, you deceitful thing,” he said, delighted. “You weren’t punching combinations at all; you were letting an automatic dialer go through infinite sequences.” The Doctor had let his phone call a zillion people, probably.

“I had a specific parameter configuration generator,” the Doctor protested.

“Oh, very well,” the Master relented. “I chose two nines because nine is a perfect number.” He twisted the phone cord around and around his index finger, feeling quite ridiculous in a pleasant way. Talking to the Doctor on a telephone was terribly intimate. “You know; like your birthday.”

“My birthday!”

The Master heard a smack as the Doctor struck his forehead with the palm of his hand. That sound couldn’t be anything else. “Yes. There are so many nines in your birth date that I associate you with perfection also,” the Master said, not missing a little hitch in the Doctor’s breathing. “Call it a weakness.”

“There’s not much about you I’d call weak,” the Doctor replied, his voice now much lower and going straight to the Master’s groin. “You’re incredibly potent.”

“Flattery will get you everywhere,” the Master said, lowering his tone to match. “So, I assume your parameter configuration generator got put to use for a good reason?”

“Oh!” The Doctor sounded startled. “Yes, actually. Are you busy just now?”

“Just personalizing my stolen TARDIS,” the Master confessed.

“Oh? Who’d you steal it from? I never asked before.”

“Some stuffed shirt,” the Master said, shrugging. “My beautiful TARDIS was all too eager for me to steal her.” He paused, savoring the fact that the Doctor could hear the deliberate, timed delay and would wait on baited breath for whatever he said next. “A Type 40-B, Doctor.”

“What? You… you’re…”

Grinning, the Master looked up at the ceiling. “I didn’t realize what a delight this model can be; so quirky, so sentient.”

“I got the very last 40!”

“No, sorry.”

“Copycat!”

“As imitation is the most sincere form of flattery…” The Master trailed off. “Besides, I’m very much a cat. Remember the Cheetah Virus?”

The Doctor went quiet a moment. “You still have it?”

“It comes and goes.”

“Explains certain things about you.”

“Coy, aren’t you?” The Master could talk to him like this forever. He made note of the Doctor’s phone number and position, seeing he wasn’t at all far from his own, currently. “No, I’m not particularly busy,” he prompted.

“Good. Where are you?”

The Master rattled off his coordinates. He’d barely finished when the Doctor’s TARDIS materialized in his control room. “How rude,” he said. “Not even a proper ‘goodbye’.”

“Sorry, what?” The Doctor asked, hanging half out of his door with his long coat flaring.

“Nothing.” The Master was so suddenly filled with warmth at seeing the silly Doctor that he couldn’t think for six whole seconds. He realized he was standing there with the phone in his hand and made an effort to hang up.

The Doctor shut his door and put out a show of strolling and looking around, deliberately casual while also extremely observant. “Oh, this _is_ you,” he murmured, looking at the wooden roundels and bright brass fittings. “Very classy. Understated elegance… warm…” He eyed the Master askance. “You’re so… brandy and opera music.”

“Whisky,” the Master corrected gently. “But, thank you. As I’m very unlikely to have any guest but you, your approval fills a need.”

They stood there looking at each other. Very on purpose, the Master remained as still as possible. The Doctor, who would bounce about like a slick marble in a shallow, curved pan with the slightest movement, didn’t fall to form but met his stillness.

“How you look at me,” the Doctor said softly.

“I’m thinking about keeping you,” the Master reported honestly. “In legs irons, necessary or not, because there’s nothing more stimulating to me than watching you pant, writhe and fight bonds.”

It was like the aftermath of a bomb. The Master should know, having set off a fair amount over the years. The Doctor’s throat moved with a single, nervous swallow. As he stared at the Master, some thought gradually stole his paralysis. Slightly, he cocked his hip and began to smile. “When I say you’re an irrepressible villain, you’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Indubitably.” The Master loved that the Doctor hadn’t balked, precisely, just frozen while processing a very sincere and threatening flirt. “You can relax. I’ve no leg irons handy.”

“Yes, well…” The Doctor gave a haughty little sniff that set the Master on _fire_ to just _take_ him. Claim what he wanted and to hell with precision, plans, and timing. “I wondered if you’d go to Beta Melca with me.”

“The fruit planet,” the Master said, wondering if that could be a vicious, hidden little slur on his sexual proclivities. Then, he remembered who he was dealing with. The only thing the Doctor liked more than Jelly Babies and Jammy Dodgers was fruit. Bananas were a special favorite. But, Beta Melca had millions of fruit varieties, some safe for absolutely any species and some deadly to all. The Doctor wanted the Master’s botany skills for a very specific episode of gluttony.

The Master approved.

“Plot the course,” the Master invited, waving an arm over his TARDIS controls. “Be my guest. Don’t stroke her unnecessarily; this is _my_ TARDIS.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” the Doctor protested. “Not with the old girl watching, anyway,” he muttered. He started, and the Master took a few moments to just admire how the Doctor did everything utterly in the most illogical, backward way yet managed to make the machine obey him fluidly.

It took a special kind of mechanical genius to even pilot a TARDIS in the first place; not everyone could do it. The Doctor took hold of the machine’s own understanding of time and space and extrapolated shortcuts and bridges with breathtaking speed. It was rather like riding in a very unstable rollercoaster with thousands of bad places in the track, the madman at the controls switching the coaster over to safe track or even hopping across at the very last second over and over. It would make most Time Lords absolutely _sick_ to even see it, but it gave the Master serious wood.

“Ah, she’s so eager to get out there,” the Doctor said, grinning and stepping back as the machine intuitively calculated the final bits and moved on without him. “Mine does this, too.”

“Nothing like a good TARDIS,” the Master agreed, leaning on the consol to cover up his rebellious anatomy. “These older women have a lot of class.”

The touchdown sound reverberated. The Doctor looked at the Master hopefully. “I daren’t touch her scanners,” he explained. “That’s like copping a feel in the backseat.”

“Ah.” The Master did the honors, amused yet touched the Doctor would be so sensitive to both his TARDIS and her master. “Successful arrival. We’re in the peach grove, I think. A thousand varieties or more, I should imagine. Shall I take a basket?” It was a small dig, but he’d take it.

“Oh, do,” the Doctor said, grinning again and looking so much like his fifth self that it took the Master’s breath. “Have you got two?”

The Master went to the pantry while the Doctor paced, and found two extra-dimensional bags with cushioning capabilities. The fruit wouldn’t bruise and he could stuff the sack from here to Doomsday if he wanted with no discernable weight. “Here,” he said, and the Doctor snatched the bag quite nearly like a rude madman.

“Allonsy!” The Doctor shouted, bounding out of the Master’s TARDIS.

“Tally-ho,” the Master said sarcastically, following.

 

**

 

The grove smelled very nice, all sun warmed and sweet. The Master strolled, picking perfect fruits at his leisure while the Doctor attempted to do the same. He was too much an excited magpie, though, and ate as much as he picked. They met at the beginning of a blueberry patch and sat on a large rock together, the Doctor making his way through a red-fleshed, white skinned blood peach. “Oh, _try_ this,” he said, handing the Master one half.

The Master, smiling, indulged him. It was tender, outrageously sweet, with superior flavor, and hot from the light of two suns. He saved the pit. “It’s good,” he admitted. He fancied himself a good cook, and thought about what an exceptional pie this particular peach would make. “If you had a home here, would you ever leave?”

“I don’t know,” the Doctor said, sounding serious. “I might revert. I might forego clothing and excitement for favor of getting up and glutting myself all day every day.” He rather slurped his way through a black skinned, white fleshed peach, making a yummy noise that made the Master’s dick threaten to stand up again. “I mean, why have a Time Lord’s taste buds and then let them go to waste?”

“You have a point,” the Master conceded. He took the peach from him, had a bite, and gave it back. “Christ,” he muttered. That one was dazzling in flavor. It would look absolute rubbish when cooked, but some things surely did look terrible and taste good. He took that pit from the Doctor, too, before the man could wing it out into the grove. “But, could you really give up the life you love for this sort of thing?” He persisted on the point, honestly curious and wanting a solid place to even start his evaluation on how to seduce, nurture, keep, and content the Doctor.

The Doctor chose a very pale green peach next, and looked at it as he thought. “I don’t know that I want to travel and interfere, to enforce justice and my ego throughout all eternity until I die,” he said. “All I ever wanted was to make things better, to make people better. It’s my own restlessness that makes me change the venue, I suppose.” He bit down, and his eyes rolled back. “Oh, God,” he muttered around the obscenely colored fruit. “Master… You have to taste this kind.”

The Master took an offered fruit and sank his teeth into it. The instant burst of hot, sugary perfection made his entire mouth seize up in ecstasy. Beyond faultless, it was nirvana. He devoured the thing without a shred of decorum. “Jesus,” he managed to say.

“I know,” the Doctor sighed. “And this? Just peaches. We haven’t made our way through the smallest percentage of them.”

“What splendid ideas you have.” The Master eased back until he lay nearly flat on the smooth, time-worn rock. It was so very warm and comfortable. “So, is your restlessness to travel more overpowering than your creature comforts? It must be, Doctor. As much as you like this planet already, you’d get bored. Your TARDIS is more than transportation, yes? It allows so much flexibility.”

“I guess.” The Doctor stretched out, too, and they lay nearly side by side on the aged stone. “I’m nomadic at hearts.”

“Yes, I know,” the Master assured. He understood very well what sort of creature held so much of his interest. The Doctor, for all his insistence upon being civilized by kindness, was a wild thing. Given the freedom to cut loose and act naturally, he exhibited a great enthusiasm for life, for experience. Such intensity thrilled the Master, who held a lot of passion, too. “Do you ever wonder why so many of our people don’t ever break out of the stultifying, suffocating yolk of heritage?” He asked, feeling frustrated. “Why do they just sit there?”

“I think they’re afraid,” the Doctor answered solemnly. “It’s hard for us to understand that, because we’re more afraid of sitting still. We always wanted to go out and see the universe.”

“True.” The Master had known this, but hearing the Doctor say it made him feel better, more vindicated. “Did you really mean it when you asked me to see the stars with you?” It was a sobering question, made even more serious by the conditions in which the Doctor had asked him. “Or, were you just trying to talk me into letting you loose?”

“I didn’t have a thing to lose by attempting both.” The Doctor reached a hand over and placed it on the Master’s shoulder very lightly. “But, yes. Every time you go away, all I can think about is your return. The universe isn’t the same without knowing you’re out in it, making mischief.”

“I have a few more dimensions than simple mischief,” the Master protested. The Doctor’s hand felt warm, steadying, like a home he’d never had and always wanted.

“I’m seeing that more and more,” the Doctor admitted. He paused. “Doesn’t this feel familiar? No stars out, and this isn’t the base of Mount Solitude, but…”

“You don’t have to say it. I’m not so far gone that I can’t remember.” The Master closed his eyes. “At least if we ever get our respective pardons, that mountain is there for us.”

“Yeah,” the Doctor murmured thickly. “Gallifrey stands.”

 


	9. Confession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He's so tired of lies.

After the trip to Beta Melca, the Master didn’t hear from the Doctor for three standard weeks. He thought maybe the other Time Lord was either processing being vulnerable in front of him, or avoiding the whole thing out of embarrassment. Each seemed equally valid avenues for the man who never stopped running. So, the Master busied himself with his various botany projects and tried not to dwell on the silence. On the absence. On the deep and abiding want.

He hated being so tied up in the Doctor sometimes. Sometimes he wanted to punish him for never seeing what they really were to each other, for never looking him in the eye and considering him as a mate. The Master could only allow for so much blame on that. Yes, he was a destructive force and frequently caused the Doctor pain, but that was his nature. He embodied darkness, winter, Death’s Angel, the sleeping of the consciousness. He was destruction and chaos.

He was lonely.

The Master looked at himself in the mirror, trying to see what the Doctor saw. This body had its upside, even for seeming short. Nice face. Couldn’t grow much of a beard, so he didn’t try; he shaved every morning. Athletic build. Wiry, trim, even vigorous. He had so much power coursing through his veins and muscles that he had to run for hours on a treadmill very regularly just to sleep during the TARDIS’ night cycle. He wore himself out on a punching bag when running bored him. As a result, he had the sort of body that the Doctor should be pleased to wallow upon. But, he didn’t. The Doctor was a Virgin King.

But, the Master allowed that part of the Doctor’s personality. The man didn’t waste himself on every attractive piece of tail to twitch in front of him. He had a more cerebral angle than physical, and the Master respected the Doctor’s mind enough to know that was just the way he’d been made. The Doctor was special.

Contrastingly, the Master had appetite. He’d always found physical pursuits highly satisfying to his body, no matter what body he wore. He loved pleasure. He’d toiled endlessly to become an ideal lover, mainly for pride, sometimes for his partner, but always with an eye toward his virginal counterpart, even before he realized he wanted him. Someday he’d get a chance to make the Doctor a bundle of lax, sobbing nerve endings that he could bend around himself and claim. Someday, he’d get inside that ice prince and melt his core.

Yeah, someday. The Master wondered if it would ever happen. He’d probably have to put as much time into wooing the Doctor, into displaying a mainly non-aggressive stance to other life forms as he had trying to hurt him and destroy what he loved. The equation was simple. The Doctor couldn’t believe in him until the switch-over occurred, whatever triggered that.

The Master combed his hair and put on a close fitting black jumper. Though he felt ambiguous about them, he put on denims, too. He needed to look Earth-casual today, because he was visiting a colony mainly consisting of humans. They’d asked him to come and repair their greenhouses. Well, they’d asked his old employers, who’d kindly forwarded the message. He’d do it, too, mainly because it gave him something to do and secondly because they might have something interesting growing on their desolate little settlement.

 

**

 

He’d just finished an exhaustive overhaul on the fans for the greenhouse ventilation ducts when he felt a familiar pull in his spirit. Somewhere, not very far away, the Doctor needed his intervention. The Master left without collecting his pay, centering on the tug as he entered his TARDIS. He closed his eyes, concentrating. There. Rigel Twelve. He plotted the course.

Once he landed, the Master hit the scanners and looked out at a busy street scene. Across the avenue was a bar, and the Doctor occupied it. Grimacing, the Master put on a long coat, tucked his new laser into one pocket and a new favorite into the other. He’d found a judicious application of a spring loaded metal law enforcement club could amend a lot of bad attitudes.

The bar was packed. The Master spied his quarry standing in the center of it, singing and doing an odd little dance. It wasn’t a dance, really; it just looked like one because when the Doctor drank he apparently compensated for deteriorating motor control by making all his motions as fluid as possible. He had at least seventy percent of the bar patrons singing along with him. His martini glass sloshed dangerously as he did a little spin and grinned at his audience. Not a shy man, the Doctor.

Smiling, the Master leaned on a support beam just to watch him. His silly, madcap, irrepressible little Doctor…

“Friend of yours?” A woman holding a tray of dirty glasses asked.

The Master spared her a glance. “My best enemy,” he told her. “My other half, you might say.”

The woman, about thirty years old and pretty enough to gather attention on many worlds, nodded at him. Her lips pulled up for a smile. “He’s had seventeen banana daiquiris and five appletinis, two Tim-Tam Slams and a Sex on the Beach,” she informed. “He can really drink.”

The Master grimaced at the information. “I’ve never known anyone so enamored of sugar,” he said. He’d have drunk his weight in whisky or vodka to get a buzz. The Doctor would have such a headache in a few hours.

“Tell me something,” the woman prompted, edging a little closer and dropping her voice. She couldn’t exactly whisper, not with the entire bar singing a rendition of ‘Don Gato’. “I’ve been watching him, and I think he’s a Libra. Is that right?”

The Master searched his data banks. Astrology. Earth astrology. He shook his head. “No, he’s a Dragon,” he corrected. “You wouldn’t think it right now, but he’s actually quite dangerous under the right circumstances.” The Master felt proud of the Doctor for that.

“A dragon, huh?” The waitress smirked a little. “What astrological system is that?”

“Ancient Gallifreyan. Yon warbler is a Time Lord.” The Master grinned as the Doctor started everyone on a round of ‘I’m Gettin’ Married in the Morning’ from My Fair Lady. A surprising amount of people knew it already.

“A Time Lord,” the waitress said. “Really? Aren’t they a bit more reserved than that?”

“Most of them are so reserved they wouldn’t get excited over their clothing being set on fire,” the Master answered.

“Huh.” The waitress eyed him a little closer. “You’re one, too.”

“Yes.” The Master snatched a shot of vodka from a passing waitress. He sensed the sub-audial hum of a large, large airship hovering over the bar. “You should get out of here,” he advised. “Your unfriendly, neighboring planet has sent a war bird over. It’ll probably let loose a barrage of incendiary in a few minutes.” He downed the shot and dropped the glass. No sense in being tidy when the whole bar was about to be blown apart.

“Shit,” the waitress said succinctly. “I hate finding a new job every three months.” She put her tray on a table, whipped her apron off, and left without another word.

The Master strolled to the door and grabbed the alarm bell, giving it five good hits. “Orderly evacuation,” he shouted. “Everyone out, now!”

It ended up being a bit too late. Even as the Master finished shouting, the top of the roof exploded. Plaster and burning tar rained down, and in the panic, the Doctor was knocked under a booth. The Master ignored the confusion and crawled under to get him. “Come on, Doctor,” he coaxed, dragging him out and making him stand with an arm slung over his shoulders. Only pausing to grab a box of excellent cigars off the bar display, the Master made his half-conscious companion walk out the back door.

“What?” The Doctor managed to say as he looked up at the aggressive ship. “What?”

“Xalarian warship,” the Master told him. “Pests.”

“This is a peaceful planet! They can’t!” The Doctor tried to free himself, no doubt of a mind to stop the barrage.

“They can today,” the Master corrected, making him go first into his TARDIS. “Where’s your time machine?”

“Two blocks over,” the Doctor answered. “See, this is why I shouldn’t drink. Someone might need me.”

They made a very quick trip.

 

“Someone will always need you. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t relax, ever.” The Master put his inebriated burden in a chair and went to the controls. One short hop had the Doctor’s TARDIS inside with them. After plotting course for the Eye of Orion, the Master lit a cigar and leaned on the Doctor’s chair, smiling down at him. “You are so very drunk.”

The Doctor belched through his nose. “Yeah,” he agreed. He managed to crane his neck to look at the Master. “How’d you know where I was?”

The Master stopped him from overbalancing and falling to the floor. “Just lucky, I suppose,” he lied. He slid his cigar into the glass tube it had come from, and corked it. Because the Doctor wasn’t in any condition to stop him, he indulged in running his hand through the Doctor’s wild mop of hair just the once. “Come on,” he bade, helping him stand. “You need a little tea before you nap. You’re already dehydrated.”

They went into the Master’s well appointed kitchen, and the Doctor sat heavily at the table. “Ohh,” he groaned. “I’m going to feel so bad in about six hours.”

“No, you won’t,” the Master informed. He changed his mind about the hot tea and poured the Doctor a tall glass of filtered water. “I’ll make sure you feel fine, Doctor. Just relax and drink your water.”

The Doctor obeyed clumsily. Twice he nearly dropped his glass. Finally, he finished. He looked across the table at the Master rather dreamily. “You have beautiful eyes,” he observed. “Always so intelligent, just popping with life.”

 _Oh, here we go_ , the Master thought with amusement. _The drunken pass_.

“You cut your hair,” the Doctor went on. He put his elbow on the table and leaned his chin in his palm. “I was getting used to the longer style.”

“It’s not thick enough to wear long.” The Master, well accustomed to overindulgence of every stripe, reached behind himself to the cold storage and got a bottle out. His remedy wouldn’t make the Doctor less drunk, but help him process the alcohol more efficiently and bolster his liver. “Some Time Lords aren’t possessed of the genetics to continually regenerate with a glorious mane,” he added. He poured a good measure of medicine into the Doctor’s empty glass and added a little more water. “Drink this.”

Again the Doctor did as commanded. He sighed and started looking at the Master anew. “Okay,” he said. “I’m pretty drunk, but I still can figure out that you seem to have a homing beacon on me or something.”

The Master thought it supremely unfair that the Doctor hadn’t fine-tuned his side of their pair-bonding. The man had a sense for him, but that was it. The Master not only had a sense for the Doctor’s position, but one for his safety. He’d considered that an aspect of being the dominant one, or attributed it to being of a violent and negative nature and more sensitive to danger. Regardless, the Doctor went haring through time and space without a clue that he had a ‘mate of opposite’. He didn’t know that the Master was the only person capable of satisfying him.

Feeling around in his pockets, the Master came up with a fine tip, permanent marker. He drew a perfect circle on the tabletop, then a wavy line through the center of it, adding ‘eyes’ and shading in one half. “This is you,” he said, pointing to the white part. “You are Yin. You are positive, the fires of creation.” He pointed to the black part. “This is me. Negative, cold, watery, destructive.” He capped his pen and lifted an eyebrow at the Doctor. “I know when my opposing force is threatened.”

“You did plenty of threatening to your opposing force for a very long time,” the Doctor pointed out. Already he sounded a bit more sober.

“Denial,” the Master explained. “I didn’t want to be half of anything. I’m egoistic.” He leaned back and crossed his arms.

“Don’t fight the force you’re nestled up against, you wrote to me.” The Doctor frowned at the Yin/Yang symbol. “I always thought this symbol looked vaguely rude.”

The Master chuckled. “Yin and Yang swirl together in the attempt to consume each other,” he informed. “Bound within a circle, they _are_ a circle. It’s poetry.”

The Doctor dropped his head to the table with more force than was healthy. “I don’t have the head for this,” he confessed. “Not now; philosophy is only good for the first hour or two you’re drunk. After that, it’s a mess.” With a jerk, he sat straight up again, fixing the Master with an unfocused stare. “Are you saying you can find me anywhere in the universe, at any time?”

“All I need is a few second’s worth of concentration,” the Master answered. “You could do the same concerning me, if you could accept what I am.”

The Doctor’s gaze cleared as he considered that. “What are you?” He asked, his voice low. “Disregarding the entire Yin/Yang thing.”

The Master smiled. “Deadly.”

Silence.

“But, not to me,” the Doctor mused aloud, “not anymore.”

“Correct.” The Master stood. “Time for bed, Doctor.”

“I don’t wanna,” the Doctor protested as the Master hauled him upright. He staggered and grabbed both the Master’s shoulders for support, knocking them together front to front.

Shivering, the Master turned him around and marched him to the bathroom. “Relieve your bladder,” he ordered, dragging him inside. He braced him on the sink and waited, employing a bit of patience even though his fortitude felt stretched thin.

“You’re telling me,” the Doctor said as he took a much needed pee, “that acceptance grants a vast power?”

The Master pinched his nose. He had a headache and desperately wished the Doctor didn’t have the wherewithal to think. Not right now. “The power has always been there,” he corrected. “Acceptance merely allows tapping into it. Think of it like a light switch. You accept that you’ll have to reach out and move it in order to use the light.”

“And you decided to accept me.” The Doctor finished and washed his hands, looking at him through the mirror.

“Eventually even I get tired of tilting at a windmill.” The Master guided him out and down the hall, putting the Doctor in the first bedroom; his own. “Take your jacket off.”

The Doctor tried and failed to even unbutton his jacket. The Master batted his hands out of the way and made short work of it, anxious to get this over with. He drew the pinstriped thing down and off, eying the dark tee-shirt revealed. “You can sleep in that,” he decided. He knelt and started unlacing his shoes. Undressing the Doctor was as stressful as it got.

The Doctor swayed alarmingly as his shoes were tugged off. He grabbed for support and ended up pushing down on the Master’s head. The position made the Master ache; those long fingers pressed to his skull, being nearly on his knees before the man… He looked upward reluctantly. And, oh, there was the _fear_. When he had nightmares about the Doctor, this was his view. Acceptance hadn’t made him less afraid, exactly, but given him a direction.

The Doctor, the compassionate Christ-figure to the universe, held the Master’s very soul in his hands and didn’t even know. But, the Master knew from experience that the Doctor, once guided, could extrapolate infinite equations and end up on the precise path needed. He’d figure it out. He’d see how weak the Master was to him.

Honestly, the Master didn’t know how the Doctor had come so far with him and _not_ seen. He wasn’t blind. The Master must have convinced him well. The victory tasted sour, especially now that the Master had given in to his terrible, frantic need and just let the love happen. He’d rather it destroy him than continue living a lie. He was tired and frustrated, lusting after the man in five different ways and more than half despairing at this point.

The Master rallied. The plan was to make the Doctor want him. He couldn’t proceed if unable to even get the man’s trousers off. Keeping the Doctor’s eyes, he reached up and freed his buttons. “Step out,” he said, proud of how level his voice sounded.

“It gives me a creepy feeling to see you down there,” the Doctor said, but he began to do as told. He still hadn’t let go of the Master’s head. “It makes me think about what you did to me in the hot tub, and I’ve been very, _very_ good about _not_ thinking of that.”

“You know your own body and you know you’re starving it,” the Master said, standing and grabbing his wrists. God, the need to just _have_ him. Right now. “Crudely put, you need your pipes cleaned every so often. And, you’re masochist enough to not even wank off in the shower.” He turned the Doctor around and forced him into the unmade bed. “I’m sorry if I traumatized you, but I wouldn’t do it over differently.”

The Doctor looked up at him with wide eyes, unmoving as the Master pulled the covers up to his neck. “You… You’re sorry?”

 _For a lot of things_ , the Master thought. _Primarily, I’m sorry I played our game well enough to make you never trust me_. He turned off the lights, glad to get away from the eyes that could easily cripple him. “Sleep well,” he bade, shutting the door.

He stared at the hallway wall fifteen minutes before he could move away. Lust and terror had made him so hard. He’d let the Doctor sleep a good three hours, waiting until he was in his deepest stage of sleep before transferring him to his TARDIS.

 

 


	10. Subjugation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Closer, closer...

The Doctor had no idea what was going on with himself, much less the Master. Centuries of animosity, of struggle, of watching brilliance give in to madness, and suddenly _this_.

He’d planted a camera in the Master’s TARDIS, and right now he watched the man. Had been watching him obsessively, actually. The camera was nothing but genius; it followed the Master everywhere but his bedroom and bathroom. Invisible, impossibly tiny, powered by the radiant light of a TARDIS, it never stopped or slowed.

The Doctor had seen the Master work in his botany lab, make meals in his kitchen, and modify or repair his TARDIS. As much as these private glimpses into the Master’s life interested him, what really took the Doctor’s attention was the Master and his weapons.

He had blades. The Master traveled all over, collecting knives and swords. He brought in sabers, mostly, or blades of saber weight and length. He spent hours upon hours polishing them, honing them to hair-splitting sharpness. He practiced with a hologram he’d designed himself in a single twenty-four hour period. The Master drove himself to exhaustion fighting the program, because as he grew in skill, so did it. He’d evidently made it to beat him, them set out to prove it couldn’t.

And the hologram was the Doctor.

The first time the hologram cut the Master, the Doctor felt his stomach twist into a knot. He’d sat bolt upright, afraid the program would continue no matter what happened, but his image merely stopped and waited. The Master assessed his wound, nodded, and the fight began again. He’d bled all over the floor before the wound healed.

The Doctor could not, would not move from his chair while the Master indulged in a fight. Seeing his enemy like this fascinated him. Often he’d wondered what the Master did when not involving him in a mad plan for power. Was this it, or had he changed his habits? Is this how he controlled his urge to hurt him? Was it catharsis?

The second time the Doctor hologram cut the Master, he split his arm like a sausage. The Doctor felt bile heave up in the back of his throat as the Master froze with the shock and pain, his saber clattering to the floor. Calmly, he removed his shirt and bound his gruesome wound. “I suppose it’s cheating, or not really a challenge to have you stop when you draw blood,” he said aloud to the waiting hologram. “But, the real Doctor would. I have to be true to my opponent.”

Oddly touched, the Doctor watched as the Master went to his medical bay and used a tissue regenerator on himself. He knew it hurt because he’d had to do it for himself more than a few times, but the Master didn’t bat an eye at having his flesh welded back together. He just sat there and worked on himself as if the pain bored him, and maybe it did. Then, he collected his weapon, cleaned it, and put it back in the collection room. Not long after, he disappeared into the bathroom.

The Doctor knew he was going past obsession and into mania, but how should he stop this?

The Master came out only with a towel around his waist, hair and skin dripping wet. He went into his bedroom but left the door open. A ringing sound came, then, and the Master took a mobile off his bedside table. “Hello? Oh, yes. Yes, I do.” His face went from boredom to impatience. “No, I don’t trade arms anymore. Call someone else.” He hung up and stared at the ceiling, his face oddly blank. Then, his eyes closed, and the Doctor felt _something_ in his brain give a little twinge.

The Master had reached out and found the Doctor. Had concentrated and found him though separated by six galaxies.

The Doctor reached inside his mind and looked for any psychic residue, any evidence the Master had been in there at all, and found nothing.

“The second moon of Zelator, Doctor?” The Master mused aloud. “What would you be doing there? Maybe you’re gathering rift energy?”

He was, actually. Cardiff felt odd to him these days.

The Master shut off his light. His lean outline moved as he lifted his hips to shuck the towel. Spreading his arms out, he relaxed.

The Doctor watched him sleep, never imagining he’d be so interested in something this slow. But, the Master’s face had turned toward the hall light, showing the Doctor a view of what unapologetic destruction looked like while sleeping.

Soft.

Approachable.

Vulnerable…

The Doctor made himself go to bed, to quit watching for awhile. If the Master could schedule sleep, so could he.

 

**

 

The Master was eating a quick, cold supper in the fencing room when he felt the Doctor fall into danger. He found him in an instant and ran to the control room to plot course. Only pausing long enough to grab his coat, the Master ran out of his TARDIS and directly into a throng of twenty-seventh century humans, gang members by the look of them. They had a lot of animal hide and metal adorning their bodies.

The Master’s hearts thundered out of rhythm as he saw his Doctor stretched out on a cross made of pipes, barbed wire around his forehead. The idiots had crucified him and put him in the back of a large flat bed lorry to drive around with him on display.

_I know you love humans, Doctor, but these you cannot save._

The Master walked straight through the chanting religious freaks, his calm step taking him farther than pushing and shoving ever would have. In moments he mounted the dais where the Doctor hung half unconscious, blood dripping in his eyes. They’d done the works on him. He’d been stripped nearly to nothing and beaten, then whipped with some sort of scourge.

“Hey, who are you?” Someone shouted, and the cry was taken up by the rest of the unwashed mob. The Master ignored them. He reached up to cradle the Doctor’s bruised jaw, listening to his inner drums grow louder and louder. The Doctor’s mouth moved. He wanted to speak and didn’t have the power, either too damaged or in too much shock. The Master gently pressed a finger to his lips and he quieted.

Louder and louder, the drums of madness and revenge pounded on. The Master looked at the large nails going through the Doctor’s wrists and thought he might heave up at the way the man’s fingers had curled in tormented rictus.

Killing was too good for these vermin.

The Master took a canister of nerve gas from his coat, pulled the pin and depressed the recessed plunger. He flung it into the crowd where it instantly knocked everyone unconscious except the driver of the vehicle. That one he yanked out, throwing him up against the lorry door. He slit his throat and dropped him.

No one came out. The alley stayed quiet. All the Master could hear was the drums and the sound of the Doctor’s labored breathing. “This is going to hurt,” he announced as he grabbed a crowbar and advanced. As carefully as he could manage, he put the Doctor face down on the dirty stage and began hammering out the right nail from the back of the cross.

The Doctor made only one sound, a muffled sob.

“The universe is getting too ugly,” the Master said, talking to keep them both occupied. “What did you do, perform a miracle?” He got the right arm off the cross, nail still intact. He couldn’t remove that until they were in the medical bay. “Why didn’t you call out for me?”

“E…li…jah…” The Doctor gasped a bit at a time.

The Master shook his head at the joke. He hammered the Doctor free on the left arm and rolled the heavy cross off of him. “Come on,” he said, urging him with soft words and hands as gentle as he could manage.

The Doctor tried to get up and failed. He did it twice more before the Master’s resolve collapsed. He picked the Doctor up and carried him to the medical bay, where he put a stasis field on him. The Doctor couldn’t do anything now, not even die. “I’ll be right back,” he promised, and he went back out to the scene of the crime.

“Up,” he commanded the crowd. All sixty-plus people awakened at the force of his will, and stood like dolls, awaiting orders. “Follow me,” he said, and he led them into his TARDIS. “Wait,” he said, and the power of his command made many of them break into nosebleeds. Some bled from their ears and eyes. They would stand there until they died, if he so pleased.

Wrath carefully set aside, the Master returned to his beloved adversary. He took off the stasis field and instantly gave him a painkilling injection of maximum strength. There, in silence, the Master removed the nails one by one. He cleaned the wounds and knitted the flesh back together as fast as possible. The drums had receded.

When it came time to remove the crown of barbed wire, he looked into the Doctor’s vast, dark eyes. “Don’t plead for them,” he said. “I have no mercy.” And, he tugged the wires off as carefully as he could. A single wound broke over the Doctor’s left eye, and the scarlet runnel streamed down. The Doctor blinked, making the path of it divert to run like tears, like crying blood.

The Master cleaned and healed the Doctor’s forehead. “Do you feel like you’re going to regenerate?” He asked.

“No,” the Doctor croaked.

“Good.” The Master helped him to stand. “Can you walk?”

“I…” The Doctor took a single step and collapsed, forcing the Master to catch him.

“Right then,” the Master said, and he picked him up a second time. “I promise not to molest you in the bath.”

 

**

 

“Do you accept me for what I am yet?” The Master asked.

The Doctor fought for focus, for consciousness. Naked, he lay upon a naked Master, in a tub of warm, rust colored water. “I want to,” he whispered, enjoying the feel of the man’s warm, slick skin. He ached all over, inside and out, but the Master’s body supported him while the water took a lot of his weight.

The Master let him lie there and think of nothing. He bathed him very slowly, mindful of his tender skin. He cleaned blood out from under his fingernails, from his eyes and face.

“It isn’t really their fault,” the Doctor started to say.

“How can that possibly be true?” The Master’s voice resonated with restrained anger. “I don’t expect you to be involved, but you cannot save your attackers from me. Do you really want them doing this to other people? Are they more important than their victims?”

“No,” the Doctor managed to say.

The Master propped him up to get the last of the blood washed from his hair. “If you won’t slow down your self-sacrificing, bleeding-hearts ways, at least get a companion. I’m starting to think they’re what kept you alive all these years.” He rinsed him again and got out, taking the Doctor over the lip of the tub and putting a thick dressing gown on him. “You’ve rested a bit; can you walk now?”

“I think so.” The Doctor tried. He was wobbly, but he stood.

“Bed.” The Master walked with him back to his own bedroom. “Your TARDIS is in the auxiliary bay,” he informed casually. “It might take a few days for you to heal from this particular incident.”

“Three, likely,” the Doctor agreed. He felt shredded. The emotional impact of crucifixion seemed of endless scope. He’d need awhile to process it.

In short order the Doctor found himself in the bed that smelled of the Master, warm, soft sheets over his body. “I’ll be a few minutes,” the Master told him, and he left.

For maybe a half hour the Doctor lay there, feeling himself falling apart piece by piece. He had a good idea what occupied the Master. There were over sixty people responsible for his condition, and the Master enjoyed murder. Sheer exhaustion made surrender impossible to avoid. He tried not to think about how the Master would kill all those humans, but failed.

“Stop agonizing,” the Master said, reentering and starting to disrobe. “They weren’t worth anything.”

“How did you do it?” He couldn’t help ask it.

“You don’t really want to know,” the Master argued, standing before him in nothing but his pants. He crawled into the bed and shut off the lights. “Go to sleep, Doctor.”

“You’re staying?"

“I have to. You need watching.” The Master got an arm under him. “You’re safe. Rest.”

The Doctor found he really didn’t want to know, after all, and gratefully fell asleep.

 

**

 

The Master watched him for eighteen hours, knowing the Doctor was mostly out of physical danger, but unable to quit worrying. Every time the Doctor started to emerge from sleep, the Master stroked his forehead and pushed his consciousness back down. Sleep was the best thing for him, and sleep this deep didn’t allow for thinking, or for nightmares.

The second day he allowed the Doctor to wake up. He made him go into the kitchen and sit while he made a simple breakfast. The silence stretched on and on until the Master thought he might scream. Ordinarily, the quiet only bothered him a little, because the drums were louder then, but this wasn’t generalized quiet. This was oppressive, heavy nothingness; because the Doctor always ran his mouth and the Master relied upon that.

“I don’t know what to do now,” the Doctor said.

“Who says you have to do anything?” The Master blended him a smoothie, putting it in a glass that wouldn’t show its horrible color. He’d used the black and green peaches from Beta Melca, a pomegranate, and vanilla yogurt. He stuck a straw in it and slid it to him.

“Even when I’m tired, I’m restless,” the Doctor told him. “Nothing’s ever enough.”

The Master knew that sentiment very well. He made two bowls of hot cereal sweetened with blackberry jam, and placed them on the table. Sitting across from his morose companion, he looked at him and thought about the issue.

“Oh, this is good,” the Doctor murmured, taking a big slurp of the smoothie. “The color’s a bit… disconcerting. Sort of grey with a green tinge.”

The Master considered that the Doctor was terrifyingly sensual while eating or drinking; it didn’t matter what was on the menu. Then, he considered that the Doctor didn’t even know this about himself. Likely, he’d driven more than a few companions absolutely spare. Martha Jones had worshiped him utterly. Then there was Rose Tyler. Sarah Jane Smith. Jo Grant. Jack Harkness. The list probably stretched to infinity. The Master’s favorite of them had been Jo Grant. He’d entertained a few inappropriate thoughts about that little slice himself.

“I guess my wrists will hurt for a long time,” the Doctor said right before taking his straw out and licking it.

The Master watched that agile, pink tongue wrapping around smooth plastic. He’d like to take his own tongue and run it down the Doctor’s long, corded throat. He made himself eat cereal instead, thinking that if he had to watch the Doctor make love to his breakfast much longer, he’d have to go wank in the bathroom.

“You aren’t saying much,” the Doctor commented, taking up a spoon and trying his actual food. “Oh, this is good, too.”

“I’m not as talkative as you are,” the Master pointed out. “But, I do like how you fill the silence.”

“Really?” The Doctor’s eyebrows went up. “You like my chatter?”

“I do.” The Master shrugged. “You have the gift of gab, whereas I usually have very unpleasant things to say.” He finished his breakfast and prepped his coffee maker with Kona. “Aside from your wrists, how do you feel?”

“Sore, traumatized, outside myself,” the Doctor listed. “Fine.”

The Master shook his head as he waited for the first, beautiful brown drops of coffee to fall into his cup. “You think that’s fine. Well, I suppose you would. It’s how you exist, isn’t it?” The coffee matched the Doctor’s eye color in this lighting. “Why don’t you take a vacation?”

“Something always happens when I do. I’m a trouble magnet.” The Doctor was suddenly looming over him from behind. “Did you make enough for two?”

“Of course. You’re my guest.” The Master got another cup out. “Cream and sugar in the cold storage. Flavored syrups in the cabinet over my head.”

The Doctor didn’t move for the bottles, but continued looming. “I have a confession,” he said. “And if I don’t say it now, I’m never going to say it.”

The Master turned. He knew that look. He’d seen that particular look on the Doctor many times. It meant the Master was about to lose the game. Stomach clenching, he leaned backward until his spine hit the counter. He had to brace himself, because if the Doctor had that look, it meant something terrible and painful.

“I’ve been watching you,” the Doctor blurted. His arm shot into the air, his fist closing down on something. “With a light-bending camera.”

The Master stared at him. “Spying,” he said. “Okay.” _Get on with it. Tell me what clever, awful thing you’ve done to me_.

The Doctor’s eyebrows went up. “That’s it,” he said.

“Then why are you looming?” The Master asked him, untrusting.

“Am I?” The Doctor’s voice went up into something very leading. He took a step closer.

“Don’t play with me,” the Master warned.

“Did you interfere with Magna Charta just to get me to swordfight with you?” The Doctor asked, rubbing the distorted, not-still-invisible camera with his thumb.

“Of course not.”

“Because, if I recall the occurrence properly…” He squinted one eye and looked up, only pretending to think, the bastard. He’d already worked it out, now he was showing he’d done so. It was like taking a pike to a soldier thrown off the horse. “It really wasn’t a big enough plan, that whole Magna Charta thing.”

“You think because I made the fencing hologram in your image-.” The Master summoned up some sarcasm left over from earlier times. “You made a retroactive summation on such thin thoughts?”

The Doctor fully met his eyes, and the Master trembled inside. There was the cunning of the Oncoming Storm. “Always standing just too close,” he murmured, closing the distance and getting within the Master’s personal space. “Like this,” he demonstrated, leaning his head down. “Pushing me with your aura, beating at my defenses just because you could, making me breathe hard and fight to even stand still.” He was angry now, just thinking of their past upset him. “Killing people in front of me, swift and brutal or tortuously slow depending upon your mood.”

“I think we’ve established what I am,” the Master said, deliberately not using the voice he wanted. “Good. You do see me.”

“Stop evading.” The Doctor dropped his camera to the counter at the Master’s side, picked up a heavy pot, and smashed it. “You should be trying to change my mind, not incite me.”

“Change your mind from what?” The Master couldn’t help it this time. He sneered. He made his voice mean and sarcastic. It was all the defense he had remaining. “Fine. I decided to screw with King John just to get your attention.” Christ, the Doctor smelled good when furious. Gloriously hot and musky.

The Doctor put both hands to either side of him, on the marble, caging him in. They were standing so close. Their breathing came fast and shattered. The Master thought he might vapor lock from the pleasure of having the Doctor so near, smelling dangerous and brilliant. Fear, too.

“You did, didn’t you?” The Doctor asked. “That was just to see me.”

“Yes.” The Master’s confession left him wounded and sensitive. “I knew I shouldn’t. I knew I should have a larger plan in place.”

“Or, I’d figure it out. And I did. Very late.” The Doctor sighed. “It means I can’t point a blame finger, doesn’t it?”

“No. I’ve conditioned you to dread the sight of me.” The Master wished he’d step back or come closer. Either one would do.

“That’s true, but you aren’t an academic exercise; you’re a _complicated_ thing.” The Doctor put a hand up and rested it on the Master’s shoulder. “Master?”

The Master couldn’t look at him, he couldn’t.

“This person I’ve been watching isn’t a trick, is he? This person is really you.” The Doctor shifted and lowered his head until the Master had to look at him. “What’s happened?”

The Master put a hand on the Doctor’s left hip and tapped out one-two-three-four, twice. “I’ve already told you,” he murmured. “The drums are softer now. I’m able to think.”

“Thinking isn’t the issue; you could think brilliantly even with that noise in your head.”

“No, Doctor, thinking is the _crux_ of the issue.” The Master felt his hand clenching, trying to bring the Doctor even closer without permission. “I might’ve been able to hatch plots and foment trouble with this maddening rhythm getting louder and louder in my head, but I couldn’t pace my mind slower than…” He tapped out one-two-three-four three more times on the Doctor’s hip. “And, the slower pace is what allows deep thought, contemplation, the philosophy of distance.”

He’d been waiting for it, but when the Doctor’s arms went around him in sympathy, the Master still felt surprised. He felt trapped, too, and struggled with _not_ struggling. It helped that the Doctor’s body felt good against his. It also helped to get the man’s wonderful scent from so close. He made himself relax into the embrace, going against so many personal barriers that he almost gagged with fear.

“I’m sorry; I know you aren’t touchy-feely,” the Doctor whispered against his head. “But, I think something like this is medicine to you.”

“The man who makes people better,” the Master murmured back. He thought the Doctor was right, and didn’t resent him for it.

 

 


	11. It's Mutual

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their issues need addressed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Despite how it starts, this is not what you think.

A resurgence of the cheetah virus had the Master in fits. He paced and prowled, filled with the need to fight, to fuck, to run and run and run. For two standard days he resisted the intoxicating need to fall into his baser self. On the third day, he caved in and picked up his phone.

“Hello.” The Doctor answered, his voice much warmer than any other time the Master had heard him. He’d parted company with the Master on tentatively amicable terms last time.

“I need you,” the Master said. It was the truth, anyway. The Doctor could fill any of the needs that made his teeth itch and his groin burn. “If you don’t help me, I’m going to turn into a large, bipedal cat.”

“The virus,” the Doctor murmured, and the Master heard him changing his coordinates. “Hold on,” he said in a very reassuring, calming voice.

“Doctor, I should warn you,” the Master hurried to get his words out, knowing the Doctor tended to jump feet first into danger. “You’ll be fending me off the entire time you’re helping me.”

The Doctor’s low, amused chuckle made all the hair stand up on the Master’s nape. “I’m used to that,” the Doctor reminded gently.

“Not in this way,” the Master rasped, his throat suddenly dry. “My regard for you will stop the violence, but it won’t stop me from animal passion.”

“I understand.”

The Master heard the Doctor’s TARDIS materializing in his control room, and hung up. Running a shaky hand through his hair, he got off his bed and made a staggery path toward the Doctor’s location.

“Good heavens,” the Doctor exclaimed as they caught sight of one another. “You’re pouring sweat. Your metabolism must be jumped up awfully high.”

The Master leaned against a safety rail and clenched both hands around it. “I meant what I said,” he reminded. Oh, the Doctor’s smell. It seemed to taunt him deliberately now, doing the olfactory equivalent of twitching its hips. “I tried to release some pressure with pleasure droids. All that accomplished was greater hunger and some broken bots.”

“You went to the Pleasure Planet?” The Doctor stuck his stethoscope against the Master’s chest, listening to one heart, then the other. “If you didn’t find any relief with the droids, it’s because they don’t make pheromones, or bleed.” He pressed a hand to the Master’s throat and timed his pulse. “You’re racing in place.”

The Doctor’s touch banished all higher thought in an instant. The Master grabbed him and forced him to a wall, pressing their entire lengths together. He didn’t know what he might have done next, for the Doctor lifted a hand and simply stroked down his head. It stopped him dead, that wonderful, soothing touch. He arched into it, throwing his head back to gasp out loud.

“Your canines were impressive before, but now they’re just…” The Doctor, still stroking his head, maneuvered from the wall and took his hand. “Come on. We’re not accomplishing anything in your control room.”

The Master’s jumbled senses were so full of the Doctor he barely understood they’d made it to his bedroom, or that the Doctor was somehow managing to undress him while he petted his head. “You’re shaking like a leaf,” the Doctor observed in a worried tone. “I don’t understand. You’re male, so why go into heat?”

“Time Lord genetics, dummy,” the Master managed. “A _human_ male undoubtedly wouldn’t… I resent that; I’m not in heat.”

“You most certainly are.” The Doctor pushed him down onto his wrecked bed. “Well, what do you call it, then?” He shed his jacket and went on to loosening his tie, dark eyes considering him thoughtfully. “It isn’t exactly estrus, I suppose, because you haven’t got the equipment for that.” He got his shirt off and bent to remove his shoes. “What’s it feel like?”

“Like I’m coming apart and physical stimuli is all that prevents it happening.” The Master grabbed his sheets and bunched them up, twisting. They began to tear, and the sound made everything better and worse at the same time. “My body wants used.” _By you_ , he added privately. The Doctor had only been half right about the reason the pleasure droids hadn’t satisfied him; he wanted the Doctor, not some soulless machines. Busting a nut wasn’t as important as getting a dose of the infuriating idiot. “Just pet me awhile.”

“Okay.” The Doctor stretched out beside him and began a careful, gentle sweep down his body with the lightest touch. He went down his side and made a slow circle on his thigh. “You don’t seem to shake as much if I’m making contact,” he said thoughtfully. He laid his fully spread hand out across the Master’s jerking belly. “Does it hurt?”

“It aches,” the Master admitted. “Every muscle I have seems to be flexing.”

“Has it been this bad before?” The Doctor rubbed his pectorals, which served to calm the Master a lot.

“Once.” The Master closed his eyes to better concentrate on the Doctor’s contact. “I was able to exhaust myself to get through it.”

“That hasn’t helped this time?” The Doctor stroked down his arms one by one.

“No.” The Master stopped himself from grabbing the Doctor only by maximum effort. He suspected the reason he couldn’t run or exercise his way through this latest flare-up was because he’d acknowledged the Doctor as his mate. A mate was the natural outlet for something like this.

“But, I _do_ help,” the Doctor said, keeping up that slow, soothing petting. “Why?”

“Same species,” the Master told him, and it wasn’t a lie. “The virus taps into the basic needs or desires. I could have sex with anyone, but unless that person is Gallifreyan…”

“Ah,” the Doctor breathed. “I see.” He smoothed the Master’s brow tenderly. “And, I’m safe, aren’t I?”

“Oh,” the Master said, expelling a short, harsh laugh, “no, you’re far from safe; you’re the most dangerous, blood-soaked thing in the universe, Doctor. What you are is _appropriate_.”

“So…” The Doctor placed his hand across the Master’s neck. “So, like calling to like, is that it?”

“Flatterer.” The Master never for a moment in his entire life had imagined the Doctor could consider him an equal. He wasn’t an equal. The Doctor was superior to him in so many ways. His sense of justice granted a sort of focus that lesser motivations couldn’t inspire. “More along the lines of polarity, isn’t it?”

The Doctor made a murmuring noise. “Look at me,” he said, and the Master thought he’d never heard him sound so persuasive.

Very slowly, the Master began turning his head. He really didn’t want to look into the eyes that saw infinity, see his judgment. But he couldn’t stop himself. The Doctor’s eyes, bottomless and eternally kind, stared into him.

“I know what’s happened,” the Doctor informed softly. “You think we’re pair-bonded, like in the old tales and songs from the Emergent Times.” There wasn’t a shred of belief or agreement in his gaze, but neither was there ridicule or censure. “I can honestly say I’ve never been more complimented.” His hand came out, his beautiful, terrible hand, and spread long fingers over the Master’s jaw; five points of searing pressure with the lightest touch. “For you to believe it it’s more than vast; it’s a complete reversal of everything I thought I knew about you.”

The Doctor had treated the Master to his mercy on many occasions, but never had it seemed so honest.

“But that’s all right,” the Doctor went on, still speaking so intimately, so lowly. “Because I’m about to tell you something that will finally prove to you how amazing you are, so you won’t care about getting the praise of slaves.” He touched the Master’s mouth lightly, dragging his finger down to trace the corner as if he could make him smile. “I’ve been watching you, and I finally put the pieces together.”

“What?” The Master croaked. He knew they were pair-bonded. The Doctor couldn’t change that with his brilliance. Yet, he had that look, the one that meant absolute surety. When he wore that look, things tended to come to pass exactly the way he said they would.

The Doctor smiled at him tenderly, which made his hearts beat out of rhythm. “You won, Master.”

“Won?” The Master couldn’t fathom either the message or the intent. He never ‘won’. “What’ve I won, then?”

“The game, on your terms,” the Doctor told him, still smiling. “We _are_ pair-bonded, that’s true. But, only because you believed it.”

“W-what?” The Master swallowed, feeling eternity come rushing at him hot and seductive. His breathing had dropped to nearly nothing. “No, that can’t be.”

“It is.” The Doctor sat up and forced him to do the same, and the Master found he wasn’t writhing in heated anguish anymore, just thrumming with an odd vibration. “See? You feel better, don’t you?” The Doctor gently clamped his hand to the back of the Master’s neck. “One of the things you’ve never had any trouble with is believing in yourself. Your willpower was nearly off the scale _before_ you quieted your drums with a more orderly incarnation. Now, your beliefs have power immeasurable.”

Swallowing hard, the Master grabbed onto the Doctor’s words and rode them into his mind’s maelstrom. “I made us pair-bonded just by believing it was true?”

“Yep.” The Doctor tilted his head and gave him a grin. “You’re amazing. I always mourned that your madness kept you from showing how truly great you are. And, here I am, seeing it. Your greatness.”

The Master thought _he_ might be seeing that, instead. If he’d just found out he was trapped into an eternal bonding simply from the power of someone else wanting it, he’d be furious and frantic. Not the Doctor. He was too _impressed_ to be frightened, too honestly appreciative. He was like that, though, free because he let everything in himself just flow like water.

“Why aren’t you angry?” He asked, though he knew the answer already. He only wanted to hear what the Doctor would say, to see it on his face.

“Because it’s brilliant of you,” the Doctor answered, eyes sobering. “And, because I happen to know of a certain prophecy that the Time Lords used specifically to cook up that plan of putting the drums in your head. They misinterpreted it, and look at what evil they’ve done.” He put his hands back up and upon the Master’s brow. “Here’s the prophecy.”

The Master listened at a short phrase about the end of time and two combatants locked together for all eternity. Two combatants locked. Not fighting, just locked.

When the Doctor drew out of his mind, he understood. He, the Master, had righted a union that the Time Lords had perverted, and all with his own beliefs. They’d given him the drums to forge a link, and in doing so had crushed his focus, his strength. When the Time War unlocked, thanks to Rimpoche, the Master’s new concentration had allowed him to sense the Doctor the way he always should have, and his own determination had forced reality to change back onto the proper path.

“Oh,” was all he could manage to say.

“Yes, ‘oh’, my lawfully wedded,” the Doctor said. Suddenly, he gave the Master a dubious frown. “Do you even know what pair-bonding really is, what it does, how it acts?”

The Master suddenly felt like a worm on a hook. “I thought it was us,” he defended.

The Doctor looked up as he thought. “Well… Yeah,” he admitted, nodding. “Actually, yes. But that’s no good, because we need to know what it’ll do to us. We already know what it _has_ done.” He gave the Master’s body a curious glance. “You’re not in heat now.”

“Damn it, I wasn’t!” The Master protested. “Look, you’re the king of running away. Why aren’t you running away?”

“Because I tried that once, and if I hadn’t, I could’ve been there at your resurrection and prevented the botching of it.” The Doctor’s eyes went bottomless. “Because, I would have stood there and watched you kill your willing worshipers, lamented what a murderer you were, then stopped Lucy from throwing her poison into your life brew.”

The Master stared at him. He’d meant that shit.

“The pressure was showing up on me, too,” the Doctor informed. “The pressure of the prophecy of us. Only, instead of doing the brave thing and choosing you, I tried to control you.”

The Master clutched his left heart at a sudden, stabbing pain.

“See, I took the first step at controlling you on Sarn. Tried to shake off the creeping tendrils of foretelling that I didn’t understand, just arbitrarily rebelled against.” The Doctor smiled a sad, bitter little smile. “That’s so me, isn’t it? I’m good at sensing when I’m wanted, and shortly escaping thereafter. Letting you die in Numismaton flames would free me.” He bit his lip and looked down as if he couldn’t bear to meet the Master’s eyes anymore. “It was the most selfish, cowardly thing I’ve ever done.”

The Master looked at him, seeing not a coward, but man with hearts full of blood and fire.

“And every single time we met thereafter, I had to look at you and see how I’d failed you. Worse, I felt I’d violated some law greater than any I’d ever encountered, feeling that brokenness and knowing I had to have done it, yet still not able to understand anything about it.” The Doctor shook his head, his hand going into his hair and pulling. “We might have ironed things out before now, if only I’d reached behind me and flipped a single switch. If I’d opted for mercy. If I’d chosen to keep letting you hurt me.”

“Stop,” the Master whispered. “Just stop, Doctor.” He couldn’t listen anymore. He was overwhelmed. Too much, too fast.

The Doctor took his hand and gripped it, still not looking at the Master, but using him as an anchor. “What a passion play we are,” he said, his voice twisting with disgust and acrimony. “If not for you, there’d still be no path. If not for them, the Time Lords, we might already be happy, Master. If not for me, too.” He squeezed harder, almost painfully. “I’m ashamed. You were hurting, crippled, and _you_ still had to fix things. I should have helped you.”

This victory didn’t taste good, the Master decided. The Doctor unraveled before him, swept up in guilt that should have a bit more distance. But, the Doctor was nothing if not perceptive, bestowed with the bigger picture. He thought everything was his fault, though, which wasn’t at all true. His Christ Complex shone like a supernova, had a tangible life radiating around him. It gave him a lot of power, but it ate him from the inside.

“Shut up.” The Master knocked him back down to the bed and crawled atop him. “I’ve always known I’m dominant, but that’s no reason to let Fate walk all over you; Sarn was ugly all the way around. You’re too much a bleeding wound. Look, your wrists should remind you of that, at least until the scars fade.” He leaned in and put their faces so close he could taste the Doctor’s exhales. “You couldn’t be a mate for me if you didn’t have that sort of darkness lurking around in your soul, so stop agonizing.”

“I’m just telling it like it-.”

“Shut up,” the Master insisted. “We need to act together, not fall into silly finger-pointing. That’s the old us.”

The Doctor looked up at him with eyes going serious and attentive. “Oh. We need to find out what the pair-bonding really is, don’t we? Have to know what it does. Sorry. Got caught up there a minute.”

“You’re as crazy as I am, you know.” The Master felt himself smiling.

A little huff of a laugh left the Doctor’s mouth. “Probably,” he admitted.

 

 


	12. Allonsey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now, it's getting real.

The Doctor wandered the Master’s TARDIS, exploring. His host had begged off for a long, restful nap, and the Doctor honestly couldn’t blame him. He felt rather done in himself, but ran on nerves and couldn’t quit.

He had a husband.

Oh, not as simple as a husband. Having a regular husband would be a tiny thing compared to this. No, what the Doctor had was a mate. A mate he could never deny. He knew that much about pair-bonding. He and the Master were as paired as two paired things could be. Neither of them could have anything serious with anyone but each other. They couldn’t sire children apart. They couldn’t ever fully separate.

It was scary, and exactly what would have always happened. They’d been born for it. Had their people not made the Master insane in his childhood, they’d have doubtless spent their lives together all the way up to now.

The Doctor found a greenhouse. The Master loved botany. Smiling, the Doctor went in and had a look. The smells and colors of life seduced him. He strolled slowly, recognizing many plants and finding others a mystery. The Master apparently liked Earth roses, for there was a large section dedicated to them.

 _How like the Master_ , the Doctor thought, looking at the evidence of patient, cunning crossbreeding. He’d built a rocket capable of space travel with cellulose food scraps, so this was kid stuff, bending plants to his will. A brilliant mind, ever and always, and the Doctor now had exclusive rights to it. Special privileges to the best mind he’d ever known.

Moving on, the Doctor found half-grown peach trees, and he could just bet they were from their trip to Beta Melca. He knew in his hearts the Master had added them to his greenhouse because of him. He stroked a tender green leaf with his thumb, seeing the health of the plants. They were in perfect condition. All the plant life in here was. The Master not only had it in him to protect, but to nurture. The Doctor had always known that. Seeing it comforted him.

He left, and went back to his TARDIS. Once inside, he cued his camera footage up to see what the Master had done with his captured zealots. He watched the Master come striding into his control room with blood all over his hands, the Doctor’s blood, and open the main door. He made his prisoners walk into space one by one with full comprehension of their fate.

Oh, how they screamed. The Doctor felt sick, but he watched them die until the bitter end. For the Master, it was actually merciful death-dealing. The man stood there with his face like a stone, like someone eliminating vermin. When the last human met Fate, he shut the doors and returned to the Doctor.

The Doctor focused only on the Master as the scene of his healing unfolded. The man who could slaughter billions and go about his day with serenity, didn’t like the Doctor’s pain. His eyes burned with worry. His hands moved over the Doctor with gentle thoroughness. The camera had zoomed in to adjust for their movement, then didn’t pan back out, affording the Doctor with a close look at the Master’s face. It wasn’t the Doctor’s imagination that the Master looked at him with real feeling. It was then that the Doctor understood what that really meant.

He alone had the power to make the Master feel the tender emotions. The ones that got you into trouble. The ones that made you weak. _**He**_ was the Master’s weakness.

The Doctor shut off the footage and palmed his consol. “You’re going to be a passenger for a time,” he announced. “I’ve got to sort myself out, and the Master; you don’t mind?”

The TARDIS said nothing of course, but the Doctor could feel her patience. She’d wait.

“Okay.” The Doctor went back out and shut the door. He didn’t lock it. Aiming for the Master’s bedroom, he made his feet move.

The Master of All Things lay in his messy bed, sheets tangled around him. Despite the chaos, he looked as if he slept deeply. The Doctor could barely grasp the magnitude of him. He’d set them back on the course of their predestined lives by doing something the Doctor hadn’t the courage to do; namely, to decide what he wanted. He’d chosen. He’d made the first step to peace between them.

It was incredible what he’d done. He’d brought part of an older, more rational self and merged him into his less stable identity, sacrificed his joyous insanity for better control. It was unprecedented. It shouldn’t have worked, probably. But, he’d succeeded. And the blend was breathtaking.

“You’re so beautiful,” the Doctor murmured. “I knew you were.”

The Master moved onto his side for a deep sleep-sigh. “Doctor,” he said, but he wasn’t awake.

“Stone cold brilliant,” the Doctor said, repeating words from their past. If he had to be trapped in a sort of soul-mate-predestined path, he couldn’t ask for a more involved other half.

He hadn’t dressed, so it was simple to slip into bed. He debated taking his pants off, but then considered how the Master apparently felt, and left them. The Master desired him. A lot. More than a lot. And it wasn’t like the Doctor felt repulsed by that, not at all. He just had a sense they needed a bit more time before they took a step that neither one ever imagined would come to pass.

Still. Nothing wrong with a bit of touching, right? It soothed both of them, and they both needed soothed. The Doctor got behind the Master, spooning him. He ran his hand down the Master’s chest, torso and abdomen, feeling a lot of hard muscle and smooth skin. Insane strength sleeping, waiting to awaken and flex. The Doctor now had to think of their bath together.

That bath. Oh, _God_ , that bath. He’d deliberately not thought of it. The way the Master had so effortlessly taken control of him and his body, stroking him through an amazing, emotionally and physically cleansing orgasm. The Doctor knew he’d never felt so blissed out under someone’s hands as then. Weightless, feeling the Master’s hearts against his back, his cock expertly manipulated, that voice in his ear urging him on and on, those teeth on his neck… It made the Doctor shiver to remember. This man he lay up against knew how to reduce him to nothing but sensation. He’d even admitted to studying him for exactly that purpose.

The Master made a noise, a sigh that somehow encompassed both relief and frustration. Still sleeping, he turned over and put his face against the Doctor’s throat. “Doctor,” he murmured, his lips moving against the tender, sensitive flesh. His eyelashes tickled the Doctor, signaling they were both awake now. Too, the Master stiffened slightly.

“I couldn’t stay away,” the Doctor confessed, keeping his voice very soft. “You’re a magnet.”

“Mm,” the Master said, an acknowledgment inside a little doubt and wrapped in cautious pleasure. “Go to sleep, then. It’s a quiet, easy intimacy that shouldn’t fuss you too much.” He brought up a hand and stroked it down the Doctor’s side lightly, but the motion managed a bit of possessiveness as well. “Sharing this bed with me is new enough, right?”

“New, but not exactly strange,” the Doctor admitted. “That pull we’ve always had between us is getting stronger, I think. Can you feel it?”

The Master went very still for several breaths. Then, he made an ironic sort of noise halfway between groan and sigh. He gripped the Doctor’s hip. “Doctor,” he said, tone deceptively light. “It’s always been very, very strong for me. I’ve followed you all over the galaxy our entire lives. I even left Gallifrey because you did. For me, that part hasn’t changed.”

“Oh,” the Doctor said, feeling both embarrassed and highly lacking. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” The Master bit his neck just a smidgen too hard, making his entire body erupt into gooseflesh, his hair stand up and his groin flood with pleasurable warmth. “Where was your motivation to spend time with me? You didn’t enjoy my games.”

Now the Doctor really felt like squirming. “Well, now… Well…” He paused, aware the Master patiently listened to every stupid sound that left him. “Some of them were interesting. I mean, I never liked the stakes you set, but the problems themselves were nearly always entertaining.”

“Patently untrue,” the Master argued. “Some of my schemes were absolute rubbish. It embarrasses me to even remember those.”

The Doctor sighed. “Is this fixation with our past going to be a big part of our future? I’ve got a lot I don’t want to remember.”

The Master chuckled against the place he’d bitten the Doctor. “Holy Rassilon, you’re such a _man_ ; rude noises, sloppy eating, messy loo, no fashion sense, and now a choosy memory. If you ever, ever take the impossible into your head and start wanting a family again, I’m going to have to be the one to bite the bullet. You’ll probably make a decent husband, but as a wife you’d completely _suck_.”

“I’ve never been a good husband,” the Doctor said gloomily. He hadn’t. His first marriage had dissolved from inattention, his second from total neglect. He worried he wouldn’t be able to make this fated union work smoothly. The Master’s words sunk in, then. “Hold on. You think you’re going to have to be the female? I don’t even want children.” Privately, the Doctor felt terrified over what the Master could do as a female, with higher levels of interfering hormones. He might even like the form so much he’d never regenerate as a male again.

“That’s fine,” the Master murmured agreeably. “I was more making a point than hedging for a baby. Do I seem like the nurturing type?”

 _Yes_ , the Doctor thought desperately. _You do. You are. You are so much you don’t even know it_. He cleared his throat. “Well, point taken.”

“Go to sleep,” the Master commanded again. “You worry too much.”

The Doctor forced his eyes shut. He had a feeling he was in over his head. Worse, he could do nothing, absolutely nothing about it.

 

**

 

“Stop looking at me and thinking about children,” the Master said crossly, not glancing up from his project. “Christ, we haven’t even fucked and you’re going down the maternal motorway."

“I can’t help it,” the Doctor protested. He’d been imagining the Master as a girl all morning, and couldn’t stop. “It’s not like I want you to be female, either. I don’t know what my problem is.” He bent to smell a vibrant, silver rose, desperate for any sort of distraction. “Between us, I always thought of myself as more the girl.”

“That’s because you skillfully avoid the responsibilities of a man, not because you’re inherently feminine,” the Master lectured, carefully painting pollen from one blossom of lily to another. “Women get away with more, don’t they? They’re charming. You, Doctor, are already charming, so think about something else.” He switched brushes and moved on to the next hybridization project briskly. “Think about the logistics of us being pair-bonded with two time machines. I’ve heard stories about TARDIS’ merging.”

“But…” The Doctor felt his face move into a wild sort of frown. “They’re both female! All TARDIS’ are female!”

“Gender is one of the more tricky parts of nature,” the Master shot back. “Unreliable. There are many plants and animals that don’t follow the male-to-female encoding and reproduction rules.”

“Wibbly-wobbly, gender-wender,” the Doctor muttered. “I know that, of course.”

“You know it; you’re just too panicked to think straight.” The Master sighed and sealed his separate projects under a stasis, stripping off his gloves and binning them. “Think. TARDIS’ are grown. Ever pause to consider that? Ever check out a TARDIS incubation facility?”

“No,” the Doctor said slowly.

“That’s because they don’t exist. Our people took the raw material and set it to breeding. They don’t control it much.” The Master took up a tray of samples and peered into it, his face set in concentration. “When they have to make a TARDIS, they use a skeleton shell of mutable metal and deposit the TARDIS’ life force inside. The two fuse out of some truly thought-provoking natural aptitude, producing the magnificent structure we’re living inside of right now.” The Master paused to gaze around the room and smile slightly. “It’s entirely possible for the process to continue. Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Stop talking like that. I love my TARDIS the way she is.” The Doctor sat on a handy stool and began making it spin back and forth. He felt like his energy levels soared to the stars, and all this uncomfortable talking made it worse.

“Don’t resent her for possibly wanting a mate.” The Master came over to him and stared down. “We don’t know what our time machines really need or crave any more than we know what we want ourselves.”

“That’s true.” The Doctor had to concede that. “Wait. Charming?” He lifted his eyebrows. “I’m charming?”

“Yes.” The Master sent him a smile redolent of satisfaction and patient, even indulgent amusement. “I’m very partial to your genial, innocent act, even when it proves an overture to smashing my plans.”

A rush of feel-good swept through the Doctor. “You never said so,” he pointed out, not sure if the Master was having him on or not.

“That would have ruined my plans most efficiently, wouldn’t it?” The Master put his hands to either side of the Doctor’s face and leaned close, peering into his eyes with a gaze as soft and considerate as his touch. “I settled for being quite nicely maddened.”

The Doctor, knowing himself a sucker for the Master’s personal brand of magnetism, gave himself permission to just experience it the once. What could it hurt? He felt himself falling upward into dark and hot hazel eyes. “You’re notably charming yourself,” he muttered, meaning it. “Hypnotic, really.”

“How kind of you to notice.” The Master leaned closer, shedding his persuasive and seductive body heat over him. “But, even kinder of you to tell me.”

The Doctor shuddered and melted as the Master put their lips together. Caught in a tender grip, he froze. Resisting seemed rude as well as futile. So he simply surrendered to the expert manipulation of the Master’s tongue, which had slipped inside him so deftly, so very serpentine that the Doctor’s groin gave a mighty wrench. He felt his hands reaching for the Master, sliding over hard shoulders and sculpted arms.

But, the Master pulled away gently before the Doctor could even understand he’d moved. He smiled at him, his gaze taking in the Doctor’s lips, then his eyes. “Natural, aren’t you?” He asked, shifting and cocking his hip.

“You taste exactly the way you smell,” the Doctor blurted.

The Master blinked. “That’s the way it should be.”

The Doctor thought about his ex-wives and knew that hadn’t been the case. “Never experienced it before you,” he admitted.

“Hm,” the Master mused, not of a thoughtful tone or of a dismissive one, but somewhere in between. He ran the back of one hand down the Doctor’s jaw, so easy and savoring that the Doctor couldn’t help turning to relax into that stroke, eyes closing.

“You’re so pure,” the Master told him lowly, not lifting his hand but caressing him again and again. “You lie and lie and lie with that beautiful mouth, but I can get the truth out of it after all, can’t I?”

The Master’s voice, low and sensual, banished the Doctor’s higher brain function. He started to agree, and then stopped because he didn’t know what the Master had said in the first place. Something about lying. Or, was it truth? He settled for making an embarrassing, moaning noise as he followed that warm and kind hand.

“You make me regret wasting a few centuries,” the Master continued, speaking in that rumbling voice, now stroking the Doctor’s throat. “How lovely you are, Doctor; how sweet.”

The Doctor couldn’t speak a word, because the Master’s words had stolen all interest in talking. His head dropped back and instantly gained the steady support of the Master’s other hand. Unmoving, unthinking, he fell into another level of surrender, one not easily recanted. It felt like drowning in warm, thick oil. It felt like he grew heavier and heavier, at one with a force of gravity determined to suck him down into blissful oblivion.

“Dear Christ,” the Master growled. “This is what I get when I slacken in my self-control.” The Doctor felt lips skimming over his windpipe, leaving a ghosting, burning echo. “Wake up and give me a shove, Doctor,” the Master ordered, “before I completely give in to the temptation of you.”

The order shook him free. The Doctor jerked upright and pushed before he could even consider if that was what he really wanted to do, giving his tender assailant a stare he knew had to be absolutely wild-eyed. “You hypnotized me!” He accused, reeling with the implications of that.

The Master gave him an infuriating shrug. “I didn’t intend to; it seems dominating you sexually comes first nature. I do apologize.”

The Doctor narrowed his eyes. There had been a time the Master wouldn’t have ever been able to hypnotize him without maximum effort. “You’re saying you couldn’t help it?”

“Well, it was a strong enough urge that I didn’t know I was doing it,” the Master confessed. “However, I felt it when you handed all control over, and the shock of that made me pause.” He leaned backward onto a work table, and this time his shrug strongly suggested shame. “What can I say? Surely you know by now that you’re my greatest weakness. And, you also know what sort of animal you’re dealing with.”

The Doctor looked at him, at that too-deliberate body language, the forced casualness. The word ‘animal’ reverberated in his head more than a few times. He dragged his attention down the body of his beloved adversary, seeing beneath the façade. The Master was laying himself on the line, and utterly. He wasn’t trying to hide anything. He only waited for some sort of judgment. In fact, he expected it. More, he’d accept whatever verdict the Doctor delivered. Even if painful or wrong.

Maybe the Master really couldn’t help trying to seize him.

Maybe he ought to let him.

 

He’d think about it.

 


	13. Tentative

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> New wings are weak.

The Master deliberately didn’t return to his bedroom. Instead, he settled himself into a long lawn chair in his botany bay and stared up at the brilliant, moving stars all during the night cycle of his TARDIS. The stars took on the Doctor’s brilliance and unfathomable dimensions, the blackness of space emulating the Master himself. He looked until he felt himself falling upward into oblivion, until the Doctor’s points of light became a swirl of beautiful chaos.

He didn’t sleep. How could sleep come when his consciousness tried to comprehend the hot, sparking eternity of a man so much better than Time Lord? The Doctor had forged himself into a power so unique as to be without a label. The Master had no starting point for that. He hadn’t a way to measure his mate. He lacked. He feared he couldn’t ever catch up.

Like a deadened, stupid thing he lay there and absorbed his own failures. The Master sensed his bond-mate pacing back and forth within the primary bedroom, felt his frenetic worry and preoccupation. It was hateful that he couldn’t soothe him; he wanted to, truly.

 

**

 

“Look here,” the Doctor said, standing over the Master with two steaming mugs. “I’m the injured party. Sort of. Maybe. I don’t know.” He held one of the mugs out. “Tea?”

The Master accepted, but he could barely look at the Doctor. The enormity of him had never seemed so plain.

“I mean,” the Doctor prattled on, taking the other chair cattycorner to his, “I do know how you are, but I don’t really, do I? I just think I know. What you are and what you’ve always been might not line up.” He looked ceilingward a moment, considering. “Well, can’t be, can it? The man you were before would have put a knife in my ribs rather than put his mouth on me.”

“That’s what you think,” the Master muttered, sipping his tea. Of course, it was brewed perfectly. The Doctor loved tea.

“And anyway,” the Doctor said, not hearing him, “I sort of… liked it. The not being in control part. Took a lot of my responsibility away.”

“That’s how most are conquered; so few have the stomach for rule.” The Master noticed the Doctor had forgotten his tea in favor of staring upward.

“And that’s what I am; irresponsible,” the Doctor whittered, not a shred of apology in his tone. “Doesn’t that upset you? It upsets a lot of people.”

“Do you really want my opinion, or are you just talking to hear yourself?” The Master asked simply, too overwhelmed to even be irritated with the Doctor’s self-absorbtion.

“So, I suppose your skills as a hypnotist might not be as much to blame as my eagerness to not take _any_ blame.” The Doctor channeled his fourth incarnation for a few seconds, giving the Master a serious thrill. The fourth had absolutely mesmerized him at times.

“Doctor,” the Master said, gaining the man’s attention. “I’m not sitting out here sulking because I accidentally hypnotized you.” Thank you, he very deliberately wasn’t thinking of that, because the temptation of it would unman him. “I’m pondering how big it all is, how big _we_ are, and how small. If my mood suffers, I fail to see what can remedy that except for time itself.”

“How big we are,” the Doctor repeated. “How small.” He set his mug down and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Are you sorry? That it had to be me, I mean.”

“It always had to be you.” The Master didn’t see the point in talking about it, really. “I suppose it isn’t very romantic, sorry.”

The Doctor smiled at him broadly, still leaned over like a schoolboy about to share a secret, and the Master’s hearts skipped around a few times. “Well, I’ll take a grand gesture over romance any day.”

God, he was so… So him. The Master hadn’t spent so much time in the Doctor’s presence since childhood, and their personalities hadn’t been quite this developed. In some of the old tales of pair bonding, a common theme was the importance of a mated pair growing together. They hadn’t been afforded that.

Sweet, terrible, kind, magnificent and frightening; the Doctor. Currently, the man stared into the Master like he could divine through him. Those dark and beautiful eyes… The Master wanted to swim in them.

“So…” The Doctor slowly blinked. “What should we do now?”

“You take instruction? I wasn’t aware,” the Master murmured, pleased to be consulted. “I have one idea. Kiss me.”

“Just like that.” The Doctor continued to stare into him. “Planned passion, the hope for it, or humiliating me?”

The Master supposed he deserved that witty comeback. He gave the lawn chair beside him a little push. “Sit and watch the stars with me, then.”

The Doctor blinked and silently obeyed.

They sat there together for a long while, and if their time didn’t pass companionably, it passed peacefully. The Doctor eventually dragged a bag of jelly babies out of his inner coat pocket and offered them. The Master took seven of them and tried to guess which flavors he’d drawn. Mostly anise. He liked anise, especially when made into absinthe.

“There’s a lot of species that mate for life,” the Doctor said. “Nothing on Gallifrey seems to, but I wonder if we were supposed to.”

“Doesn’t matter. We have.” The Master ate a raspberry baby. “So, I hope your sexual reluctance doesn’t last longer than a few, stubborn decades, because I’m exceptionally physical by nature.”

“Yes,” the Doctor murmured. “I’d noticed.”

“Oh, that’s sweet.” The Master threw him a grin. “When did you notice?”

“Somewhere around your War Chief days.” The Doctor’s eyes gained a liquid, deep quality that the Master found fascinating. “And, after,” he went on, admitting easily. “That Svengali incarnation you’re using to calm yourself is actually one of the more active of your past bodies. Is there some sort of synergistic effect in play?”

“You know,” the Master said after a good, sharp inhale through his nose, “you scare the hell out of me.”

“I do not.” The Doctor dismissed the confession instantly. “What scares you is that we’re exactly alike, and you no more wanted to be like me than I wanted to be like you.”

“You’re just cementing my own opinion,” the Master warned. “What _isn’t_ frightening about having an intimate enemy become the ultimate intimacy?”

“Try saying that three times fast.”

“I would, but it wasn’t one of my better linguistics manipulations.”

They shared a stupid smile, saw it, and smiled a second time. The Doctor chuckled. “I have to admit, you’re charismatic,” he said. “Absolutely, bloody captivating. Always were. You’ve just refined it.”

The Master had often considered the Doctor exactly in that way, but he didn’t say it. He didn’t have to; the Doctor knew it anyway. He held his hand out for more jelly babies. “Be honest,” he asked, and he used his nicest, most polite tone. “Do you just not like sex?”

The Doctor began to blush, and the Master had never seen blushes cleverly faked, but he had to wonder if the Doctor was capable of them. “Not so much, no,” he said, and it sounded like the truth. Head down, he began picking a jelly baby apart, limb from limb. “I mean, parts of it can be brilliant, but then…”

“Commitment,” the Master finished for him.

“Yeah…” The Doctor shrugged. “I always get expected to stay. And I can’t stay. Even when I want to.”

The Master experienced a flash of sameness, which bled into a creeping horror, then sort of oozed into his jealousy-driven pleasure centers and dispersed into rank, to-the-atomic-level smugness. “Don’t feel like that right now, do you?” He asked.

“Well, no,” the Doctor admitted, still innocent to what that could mean. “You’re like me, though. You know what it is to want to travel.”

“Admittedly.” The Master considered dropping the line of thought then and there, but he couldn’t. The Doctor’s reaction would be too good, he felt sure. “I wonder if that feeling meant you were reserved for me?” He pondered aloud, deliberately light of voice. “A nagging little perimeter alarm, warning you were getting too close to sharing what was supposed to me exclusively mine…”

The Doctor went stock still. He even quit chewing. His eyes moved back and forth, though, processing the idea and letting it run riot in his Possibilities Processors. Slowly, he began chewing again and blinked. “I’m not going out to seduce someone just to prove that,” he warned. “And, you’ve just opened another big tin of wet gelignite on an already terrifying and insupportable twist of cosmic fate.”

“There wasn’t any use in keeping the thought to myself.”

“You’re a tornado in a trailer park,” the Doctor said, putting his sweets away.

“You say the nicest things, Oncoming Storm.” The Master put his elbow on his chair arm and quirked his fingers. “Take my hand.”

The Doctor moved very slowly. His careful contact spoke volumes about how he wanted to trust, could hardly bring himself to in even small ways, and how he yearned to touch the Master anyway. Palm to palm, they laced their fingers at the same time.

“My first impression of you, when I touch you, is strength,” the Master informed, his voice calm and level. “You have vast reserves of it, Doctor; it overflows in you and comes out as an immense power. If you weren’t benevolent, you’d be unstoppable. You’d be the Valeyard.”

The Doctor shuddered.

“People are drawn to you as much for your goodness as they are for your exotic beauty,” the Master went on. “And, you _are_ beautiful. Make no mistake about that one. Entire galaxies think of you as God Almighty because of your magnificent, insistent belief that all life should be able to peacefully coexist. And, because everyone is so ready to have a god like you.”

Now, the Doctor’s bent head took on a tilt of shame. He felt guilty for having worshipers. It was just part of his goodness shining. The Master would have taken his burden and borne it as if it was a birthright.

“You carry responsibility and culpability just like the Jew those zealots believed you were.” The Master gripped him tighter, unable to stop a frission of very strong emotions zipping through his consciousness. “The Time Lords are gods that won’t walk the soil, won’t directly intervene, and you’re their son. Possessed of miracles and magic, of boundless forgiveness and compassion, you enter a tormented land, a raging sea, and say ‘Peace, be still’. And it works, mostly.”

“Your point?” The Doctor asked, misery dripping from his vocal cords.

“My point?” The Master hated having to cut his story-lesson down to essentials, because the Doctor should appreciate his legerdemain by now. “The point is many-faceted. One, you should be content with your current record as proof you’re not a gigantic fuck-up. Two, don’t beat yourself up because big daddy god lets you get crucified; that’s what he’s for. And, finally, three, you actually need Satan. If Satan had attended Gethsemane’s little get-together, Christ wouldn’t have died. He wouldn’t have been able to go on without his playmate.”

“I’ve met Satan. You aren’t him.”

“I’ve met the Christ. You’re too white.”

The Doctor gave a helpless, dry little chuckle. “Really? What was he like?”

 _A lot like you, idiot_ , he thought. “The Shroud of Turin isn’t a fake,” he answered.

 


	14. Polarity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Master has very good focus.

The Master thought for the third time that watching the Doctor eat amounted to pure torture, especially things that required a spoon. The Doctor let that slim, silver implement carve into the chocolate rum torte, and brought it up to his mouth. His eyes sparkled with anticipation. He bit his lip and looked at the dark brown sweet with whipped cream topping. His tongue came out and swept a bit of fluffy white off, then retreated back into his mouth. “Ohh,” he rumbled.  


“Christ’s sake, just eat it,” the Master demanded. “I made it to be eaten.” He hadn’t touched his own slice; the Doctor posed too big of a visual distraction.  


“I’m not hurrying through this; it’s perfect.” The Doctor put the spoon in his mouth anyway. Instantly, his eyes rolled back. “Oh, I could kiss you for this.”  


The Master almost didn’t succeed in not taunting him with that. He tried his portion and admitted he’d done correctly. “This is terribly domestic,” he complained.  


“If this is what domestication means, I’m pretty much sold.” The Doctor took another bite and outright groaned. “It’s so smooth and silky. Perfect.”  


Feeling he couldn’t get up from the table for a good while, the Master shifted until his trousers didn’t bind so much. He thought it grossly unfair that the Doctor made all his blood go south, yet remained unaffected by anything the Master did.  


“Mmmmm,” the Doctor hummed. “This is another example of how brilliant you are. I never figured you the type to learn cooking and dessert making, but you obviously have.”  


“My standards are exacting.” The Master still couldn’t focus on his torte. “If one cannot expect perfection in others, one attempts it themselves.” He motioned to the mostly whole dessert sitting between them. “There’s nearly an entire torte left; you don’t have to savor that piece.”  


“That way lies fatness,” the Doctor quipped, not hurrying in the slightest. “You’ve barely started your own.”  


“Because watching you eat is horribly distracting,” the Master told him. He managed to get a sip of black tea in his belly, anyway. “You gobbled and slurped your way through eight varieties of peaches in this amount of time.”  


“Fruit isn’t especially rich.” The Doctor took his second bite and groaned again. “What do you mean, I’m distracting?”  


The Master didn’t answer, mainly because he enjoyed the absolute torture of watching the Doctor. He hoped to someday have the Doctor as focused on the pleasures of fucking, sucking, frotting, rimming and tonguing. Just thinking about it made him half crazy, Svengali incarnation’s control or not; there were some things every incarnation had a weakness for. The Doctor always stood as the major one.  


The Doctor paused in his third bite of torte, meeting the Master’s eyes. He froze. His breathing deepened. “You’ve got a look in your eye,” he said.  


“I would hope both of them,” the Master responded lowly. “No good being lopsided.”  


“You…” The Doctor swallowed. “Are you getting off to my eating this torte?”  


“‘Getting off’ is a bit too encompassing,” the Master said. “Stimulating as you are, your current activities don’t lend well to any sexual completion; they just preoccupy with the possibility. Taunting, if you will.”  


The Doctor licked his lips and had a swallow of tea, breaking eye contact. He started eating with a little more exactness and speed. “You’re so… So…” He shook his head. “I don’t know. Randy.”  


The Master felt his lips move for a smile. “In general,” he agreed. “You’re a specific stimulus, however.”  


The Doctor blushed as he served himself another slice of torte. He might be uncomfortable, he might squirm at the idea that the Master enjoyed watching him eat, but it wouldn’t stop him from another helping of rich, chocolaty goodness. “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone so honestly attentive,” he mused. “You can kill over a hundred people and instantly focus on me again. Billions of people, actually. It’s like you’re swatting insects while we talk, like the conversation means more than leaving the swamp.”  


The Master thought that was a decent analogy.  


“And, you’ve always been that way,” the Doctor went on. “No matter how I reacted, you adapted. Good or bad. Experiencing the full range of me? It fits.”  


“I couldn’t possibly,” the Master told him, interested that the Doctor was allowing this to grow intimate. “You’re a fixed object, and I’ll never completely unwrap your conundrum.”  


“Doesn’t mean you wouldn’t try,” the Doctor countered quite correctly. “You never stop. You’re the most un-stoppingist thing, ever.”  


“So are you.” The Master gave him a smirk. “Don’t you imagine we’ll just burn a bed?”  


The Doctor’s spoon slowly slid from his hand to clatter on the plate. Eyes contemplative and dark, he looked at the Master. The Master could easily see the Doctor thinking about what he’d said, thinking about it and being detailed. His eyes half-lidded. “Rolling around with you,” he said quietly. “Letting my old enemy inside me. Letting you have me. Surrendering.”  


The Master had to shift again. His erection had reached the painful stage. Even hearing the Doctor think out loud about sex had a serious effect on his libido. “Does it have to be about surrender?” He asked. “This isn’t some cheap vaudeville act where I tie you to rails for an oncoming train.”  


The Doctor smiled a fraction. “Oh,” he said in a tone of observant argument, “don’t tell me you wouldn’t tie me up.”  


“Maybe just a little,” the Master breathed. “Not all the time.”  


Silence.  


The Doctor sipped his tea and the Master took a bite of torte, but their eyes didn’t leave each other for a second.  


“You took over me in my own bathtub.”  


“You wanted me to.”  


“I didn’t know what to think.”  


“You still don’t.” The Master broke their eye contact. He could have continued indefinitely, but the game required finesse at this point. He had serious seduction in mind. Calmly, he poured more tea for the both of them. “Having an orgasm is very healthy, you know,” he commented in his best flippant tone. “Refreshing to the body and bestowing a good mood afterward, usually.”  


“I’m not unaware of that,” the Doctor murmured.  


“What hangs you up with _me_ is that it’s _me_ ,” he continued. “If you give in to me, you give in to what I represent, which is the darkness.” He pushed the Doctor’s tea closer to him. “Sugar?”  


“Please.” The Doctor answered.  


The Master dropped two sugar cubes into the Doctor’s cup and added a splash of cream. “That you won’t just give in suggests you aren’t entirely convinced of the bonding.”  


“Oh, but I am,” the Doctor protested mildly, taking up his spoon. “But, I don’t know the exact limitations of the bonding, and neither do you. We don’t know what it encompasses.”  


“You’re hiding behind a scientific approach. You can’t do that with sex.” The Master felt a headache coming on, borne of the infuriating Doctor and his infuriating stubbornness. “You can’t reason away the darkness, either. I’m here and you’re tied to me; there’s nothing more to consider.”  


“You could sell a life insurance policy to a Time Lord on his first body,” the Doctor mused aloud, showing he’d heard every word without denying or confirming anything, the slippery bastard. Still, he sounded as if he meant what he said, which gave the Master a small amount of gratification. He hadn’t really tried to throw a leg over the Doctor yet, so having this sort of progress check gave him a lot of hope.  


“You aren’t really seeing the fun element in this, either,” the Master informed.  


“Fun?” The Doctor’s eyebrows went up.  


“Yeah,” the Master drawled, lowering his tone. “Those stuffed shirts on Gallifrey will shit themselves once they discover we’re united. Their two most meddling, tricky and persistent rogues, pair-bonded. It’s a nightmare for them.”  


The Doctor looked at him with wild consideration for almost two seconds. Then, his face eased into a terrible smile. “That _is_ fun, isn’t it?” He asked rhetorically, the life and humor sparkling in his eyes. “Oohh, no, well, it’s really schadenfreude.”

  


**

  


The Doctor dismissed himself from the Master’s company, retreating to his own TARDIS to do maintenance work and think.  


The Master wanted him. The Doctor had believed that only gradually, but now it was irrefutable. He couldn’t mistake the way the other man looked at him. It wasn’t simply lust, either, but something darkly nurturing. Something that made the Doctor’s breathing falter and temperature soar. Something that made him feel weak and loose limbed.  


He couldn’t deny an attraction to the Master. He’d fought the man’s magnetic pull for centuries. Perhaps that was as much the prophecy as the Master’s personal charisma, because they both had such a hard time staying away from each other. Even now the Doctor wanted to drop his welding tool and go see what the Master was doing.  


He felt like he was falling, falling eternally. He’d felt like that for a long time, but now there was something falling with him, something that pulled, asking for an embrace.  


The Time Lords had wronged him as much as they’d wronged the Master. They should have been encouraging them together, not pushing them apart. The best revenge he and the Master could achieve was all too clear. Become the best at pair-bonding, whatever it really was, but more importantly, just unify. Work together. Learn each other in different ways.  


The problem? The Doctor had known mostly pain at the Master’s hands. Even though his mind knew of the Master’s change, his soul had a lot of cuts and bruises. He had to figure out the best way to heal those, because, being completely honest with himself, he hadn’t the strength to fend the Master off for long. He felt surprised and proud of the Master for knowing this and not aggressively exploiting the weakness.  


Not in a million years had he imagined the Master knew him as well as he was proving. The man had studied him. Had put considerable time into considering his character, into their dynamic; once the drums dampened, he’d been able to apply his knowledge with clarity.  


One thing, one concrete thing kept turning over in the Doctor’s head. The Master and he could link and find each other, apparently without limit of distance. That wasn’t just intimate, it was unheard of.  


He thought of the Master’s playful murder of slave traders. Poison, of all things. In the past, the Master would have let the Doctor actually go up on the market, even if he decided he needed him, because the Master had a penchant for cruelty. He knew exactly where to turn a screw or put pressure.  


The Doctor sighed and put his laser spanner down. Lying on his back, looking up into the central consol’s guts, he got a sudden urge to just lay there until he fell asleep. Watching the Master’s every moment, either out of worry he’d revert or out of pure fascination, made him so tired. Perversely, that made him want to sleep in the same bed as the very thing that set his teeth on edge. Made him want to smell the Master as he slept, warm and musky and so very Time Lord.  


 _Can you hear me?_ The Doctor reached out with his mind as if looking for the Master, but added the question, concentrating.  


 _Oh, you bad boy_ , the Master answered immediately. _You didn’t even knock first_.  


_I didn’t realize there was a protocol for it._   


_Doctor, you just walked into my mind, your artron-bright aura flaring._   


_Well, where are you, then?_ The Doctor demanded.  


The Master’s mental chuckle hit him in his groin. _Your own light obscures me_.  


The Doctor thought about keeping his light close. In seconds he was able to see the Master’s mind. He was inside it. _Oh._  


 _Not what you expected?_ The Master’s intelligence lay like a vast network of webbing, thoughts and energy like gold rain drops sliding from strand to strand and junction to junction. Everything had a scarlet hue. It was warm. The Doctor felt himself vibrating in the Master.  


_You’re gorgeous._   


_You’re in my higher functions, my autonomic reasoning,_ the Master informed. _Going lower means you’ll hear the drums. I don’t recommend it_.  


 _Okay_. The Doctor looked/heard/felt/sensed. _You’re very warm and inviting._  


 _If you were anyone else, I’d have shredded your consciousness_. The Master’s words resonated, making the web above/around/below the Doctor quiver. _You’re not helpless, but…_  


 _But, you could squash me like an insect_ , the Doctor surmised. _I suppose this will work the opposite way?_  


 _I’m sure. Your mind might be a little too bright for me, though_. The Master gave him a little prod. _You’d better limit this contact. It can’t be good for you, swimming in my darkness_.  


 _What would happen if we reached for each other at the same time?_ The Doctor asked as he prepared to leave.  


 _As Time Lords, we already have much the same mind. The better question is, do we want to try something that might leave us unable to distinguish one identity from another?_ The Master gave him another, gentle push _. Go before I lose my dignity, please; you’re a force of guilt and responsibility and incredible compassion. You’re hurting me_.  


The Doctor pulled out quickly, then. He hadn’t wanted to hurt the Master. The console came into focus above him, and he fully regained awareness of his own body. His breathing had slowed, and he felt practically boneless. A shadow fell across the floor, and he felt hands wrap around his ankles.  


The Master slid him out from under his work area and crawled over top him, legs going astride. He sat on his pelvis and peered down at him, pleasure written all over his handsome face. “Use your third eye to knock,” he said, and the Doctor felt a little twinge just above and between his eyes.  


“You excel in the mental sciences,” the Doctor said, not having anything more intelligent.  


“I’ve had a lot of experience taking over minds both primitive and advanced. I spent my time in Gallifreyan prison quite well.” He leaned over, getting a double fistful of the Doctor’s jacket. The Doctor could feel his erection pressing into his abdomen. “The longer I’m inside someone’s head, the better I can control them. It’s rather like making a pearl. I get bigger and bigger.”  


“Your mind is scarlet-shot darkness and golden webs,” the Doctor told him. “The part I entered was without drums. That was your reason, your ability to be objective. I heard it.”  


“Believe it or not, that part of me isn’t as stunted as it might seem.”  


“You’re hard and you’re poking me.”  


“Believe it or not, _that_ part of me isn’t as stunted as my stature suggests,” the Master shot back, smiling. “I get bigger and bigger.”  


“Yes, I can feel that,” the Doctor told him, fighting a smile. “Sorry to make you repeat yourself.”  


“Quit trying to smother your humor; I’m clever and deserve the praise.” The Master’s body, all hard muscle and coiled tension, shuddered a single time. “Lay still a minute; every movement you make is tempting.”  


“I haven’t even twitched,” the Doctor protested.  


“Doesn’t matter.” The Master let go of the Doctor’s lapels only to put both hands on his chest. “You don’t have to move to be tempting; all you have to do is exist, Doctor.”  


“That’s very flattering.”  


“Liar.”  


The Master rolled off and stood with his back to the Doctor. “God, you’re a problem,” he said, sounding disgusted. He strode off and out, returning to his own TARDIS.  


The Doctor connected all pertinent wires and thought very seriously about fleeing.

  


  


 


	15. Alignment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Turnabout is fair play.

The Master decided he loved the Doctor’s hot tub. The ones in his TARDIS weren’t shaped quite right, and he’d have to adjust them, but right now he only wanted to soak, not to attack yet another problem. His back hurt from doing some adjustments to his own machine while the Doctor tended to a primary circuitry issue, and he’d ignored a complaining belly in order to relax his muscles in hot water. He’d have to get out before long and tend to eating, though.

The door opened and in came the Doctor. Hands in his pockets, he strolled up to the hot tub. “For being cat-like, you enjoy soaking,” he observed.

“Tigers like water.” The Master gave him a smile and leaned farther back.

The Doctor’s lips twitched. “You’re an irrepressible thing.” He shed his jacket and threw it over a hook. “Steamy in here. I can barely see you.”

“Come closer and you’ll see better,” the Master replied, but his throat had gone a bit dry and achy, because it looked like the Doctor intended to get in with him anyway.

“I fancy a soak myself,” the Doctor told him, confirming his suspicion. “Doesn’t your TARDIS have a few hot tubs?” He removed his undershirt and toed off his half-laced, ridiculous trainers. “Mi TARDIS es su TARDIS, but, really.” At this point a big cloud of steam billowed forth, obscuring him entirely.

“They don’t quite meet my standards yet,” the Master said, feeling the water level rise. “They’re shaped for big, fat people.”

“Well, only fat cats can afford a TARDIS,” the Doctor replied. “You’re more a felonious feline, aren’t you?”

“You stole yours, too.” The Master tossed a bar of soap in the Doctor’s general direction. “You know, you’re usually gone by this point.”

“Yes, well, I considered it,” the Doctor answered. “Habit. Still, it’s not cricket to bail out on you.”

“Not to mention impossible. I can find you anywhere.” The Master couldn’t help reminding him of this. If the Doctor swanned off on him, he’d bloody well go and haul him back. In chains, if he had to. “And, I will,” he added.

Quite suddenly, the Master’s vision was full of Doctor. He barely had time to inhale before he felt the man’s entire length lining up with his own; wet, slippery skin to wet, slippery skin. Strong, long-fingered hands wrapped around his wrists and forced him to stillness while hard thighs clamped his down. The Doctor’s jaw pressed against his cheek, pushing his head to one side and baring his throat.

It was his nature to resist, and the Master tried. He thrashed and writhed and threw water in waves at the attempt. All he got for his efforts was the Doctor’s grip going impossibly tight, and an embarrassing amount of blood going to his cock. Panting, he let his head drop back to the wall. He hadn’t a clue what the Doctor was on about, but his inherent sense of spiteful play took hold, and he thrust his pelvis upward. Hard met hard, and he shuddered at having his boldness met with such speed.

Metal clamped around his right wrist. He tugged at it, shocked enough to force his head around to look. The wall had a manacle embedded in it, and it looked a very new addition. “You…”

“Only the one,” the Doctor said, letting the other hand go free. “I’m not like you; I prefer to leave you some recourse of protest.”

The Master promptly slapped him open-palm across his pretty face. This wasn’t how things should go; _he_ was the _Master_.

“You love hitting my face,” the Doctor mused, ignoring the pain. He grabbed the Master’s wrist again as he drew back for another hit, forcing his index finger farther out. The Master thought he meant to wrench it backward as a corrective measure, and stiffened in astonishment as the Doctor slid that finger into his mouth and sucked on it like a candy.

“Oh, sweet _Christ_ ,” the Master gasped as a shockwave tore through him. All his thoughts evaporated like morning mist against summer sun. Electrified, he jolted gallons of water out and onto the tiles. Those teeth, that tongue… Oh, shit. Oh, holy fucking _fuck_. He went limp, his head dropping back with a sharp rap upon the wall.

The Doctor nibbled his way off the Master’s finger, then made a sharp, hearts-stopping trail up his arm to his neck. Breathless, the Master waited, his lungs halted. The Doctor bit him, and he drew enough air to cry out. He found his free hand tangled in the mess the Doctor called hair. A surge of anger hit him at how easily he’d capitulated, and he gave the man’s head a good, hard wrench. He stilled at the Doctor’s dangerous mouth sliding down to a tender spot, forgetting to do more.

“Master,” the Doctor whispered in his ear. “ _The_ Master, _my_ Master…” He bit him again, harder, and the Master heard a noise leave him he knew he’d never made before. Hearing his chosen title come from the Doctor’s mouth… Oh, God, was that incomparable. Some of his incarnations had refused to say it at all. He melted into their contact, feeling one of the Doctor’s hands clamp down softly across his throat and begin to squeeze.

Oh, hell. Erotic asphyxiation. The Master didn’t know the Doctor had it in him. And, he was pleased, really, but he didn’t know if his respiratory bypass even worked anymore, what with being resurrected badly.

Slowly, the Doctor compressed the Master’s windpipe, never ceasing the bright-sharp nips where neck met shoulder. The Master was so hard now he thought he could faint from it. He throbbed everywhere. His cock jutted up out of the water and wept. The gland behind his prostate wept, too, secreting what was needed for entry. It terrified him as well as thrilled him; he’d never let anyone have him there except for his older self, never been stimulated enough with other partners for that wetting, slicking process to begin. At best he’d felt a twinge, a reminder that it was there for use if only someone paid him enough attention.

The Doctor let go of his neck and grabbed his dick at the same time. A single stroke, only, and the Doctor owned him. The orgasm boiled up furious and hot like a volcano. The Master got an arm around his tender assailant and held on, his voice transforming from hoarse screaming of disbelief to a dismayed whimper. He thought he’d shake apart if not for the Doctor’s body holding him down.

Silence came, except for the harsh, shattered sounds of two sets of lungs working. The Master squirmed upright far enough to slap the Doctor’s face again, but he hadn’t much strength. Therefore, he succumbed to the humiliating experience of being stretched out upon the man and cradled. Both wrists free, his body singing in satisfaction, he closed his eyes and knew no more.

 

**

 

He woke up very gradually, despite a sense of urgency, because his comfort level had frankly never been so high. He was warm. The perfect body held him, even supported him. It was quiet. Even his drums were extra faint. His nose was against the Doctor’s neck…

The Doctor.

The Master lifted his head slowly, looking down upon a sleeping, peaceful, Oncoming Storm. They were in a bed, the Doctor’s bed, actually. It was a mess of tangled blankets and sheets. Both of them were completely naked, and their hair looked and felt a bit damp. They hadn’t been here long, then.

Feeling outside himself with the shame of being bested, the Master sat up cross-legged and continued to look down upon the Doctor. His bonded mate slept bonelessly, his breaths deep, even and enviable. A bit of strain showed at his temple, an eyebrow that wanted to frown. The Master picked up his hand, held it, then let go. It dropped like a stone. The Doctor was in a trance sleep, utterly vulnerable.

How long had it taken the Doctor to make him come? Three minutes? Five? No more than five, the Master felt certain. It was pathetic. He felt embarrassed. He’d wanted to _lead_ this mating game.

Still… The Master couldn’t deny the Doctor had treated him well, had approached him with a sort of careful force. No one else had managed that. Everyone, no matter how well he treated them in a bed, was afraid of him. He had to be dominant ever and always. The Master leaned over the Doctor and whispered in his ear. “Did you tailor that to me, or were you just being an aggressive prick?”

The Doctor made a sleepy noise and twisted ever so slowly to lie upon his back. “People that are always, always in control, tend to want a vacation every now and then,” he said, opening his eyes. “I told you I appreciated not being in control the last time we were in the hot tub, didn’t I? Thought maybe…” He blinked, making the simple reflex look lazy and sensual, yet remaining infuriatingly innocent. “You’re being so patient,” he explained. “And it isn’t that I’m not attracted to you. I’m just…” He blinked again, looking quite close to falling back asleep. “I’m getting old. I’m old and I’m not certain of anything anymore.”

The Master felt a hot ache in his chest become a glowing ball. Trust the Doctor to lay out his vulnerability and wait for him to show his higher self. He’d always done that. Bare your throat and wait for the wolf to show mercy.

Well, he could do that, couldn’t he? The drums weren’t pushing him anymore.

The Master straddled the Doctor, watching him rally to awareness and make an active fight against trance-sleep. But, he was losing the battle. The Master saw it plainly. His ridiculous Doctor was very tired, even drained. Hardship had done this to him, not frailty of the body. His mind was in need of blankness, his body crying out for coma. Loss upon loss, ideals crushed, Gallifrey betrayed again and again, hubris and blessed madness crashing down and promising sweet, swirling oblivion.

His Doctor wasn’t only tired. He was weary to the atom.

“I’m so sorry,” the Master whispered, their lips centimeters apart. That glowing pain in his chest had expanded. “Let me roll the stone over your tomb. Sleep until your resurrection, Doctor; but don’t sleep alone.” He lowered himself to lie just beside, and drew up the heavy covers over them both. “I’m here,” he promised, putting an arm around the Doctor’s trim little waist. “Nothing will get you. Sleep.”

The Doctor’s eyes went from true focus into exhausted relief. His eyelids fell shut. Sighing, he went utterly limp.

He trusted the Master.

And that was what made the Master determined to be worthy of it.

 

**

 

The Doctor woke and stretched luxuriously. It felt like he was alone in the bed. He opened his eyes and instantly saw the Master sitting in a chair by his bedside. He’d brought in a table, a bottle of single malt and glass, an ashtray and a footstool. In his hands he held a portable TARDIS events directory. The Master’s bottled sherry eyes slid down to him. “Sleep well?”

“Yes, actually.” The Doctor sat up and examined the Master more closely. He’d changed into High Victorian with beautiful leather shoes. All in black and white, he presented gorgeously. Still, something about the suit nagged the Doctor. “Made free with my wardrobe?”

“Mine isn’t as well stocked,” the Master confirmed, humor lurking in his gaze. “Like what you see?”

“Oh, yeah,” the Doctor admitted readily. “You look very handsome.”

The Master grinned briefly and lit a cigar. He poured two fingers of whisky into his glass and sipped it. “Maybe I should change if _you_ like it,” he teased, which made the Doctor’s stomach do a little flip.

“Wait,” the Doctor said. “Reach into your pockets. Anything?”

The Master set down his cigar and tried the inner pocket of his frock coat, first. When he drew back his hand he had a sonic screwdriver prototype. “Hm.” He slid the barrel open and examined the guts. “Gallifreyan solid state with Mercruvian relays.”

The Doctor fell back into bed, grinning fit to beat the Devil. “You’re wearing your boyfriend’s clothes,” he sing-songed. “That’s the suit I wore once I hit Earth the first time.”

The Master scowled a little, but otherwise ignored him.

“So,” the Doctor said, “you have to admit I have some taste in clothing, after all.”

“That you used to, rather,” the Master replied, pulling a pair of black, fingerless gloves from another pocket. “And you’re nothing as…” He made a face. “Nothing as _simple_ as a boyfriend.” He said the word boyfriend witheringly. He tried the gloves and left them on when they proved a good fit. Casually, not looking at the Doctor, he sniffed his sleeve. “Doesn’t smell like you anymore.”

“I’d imagine not.” The Doctor felt so smug over the Master wearing his old suit that he could barely contain it.

The Master stubbed out his cigar. “Are you going to get up anytime soon?”

“I don’t know. I feel lazy.” The Doctor was glad he’d put out that stinky smoke.

“You’ve slept forty-six standard hours.” The Master took another sip of his drink. “Your nightmares are epic, to judge by how you thrash and moan.”

“You’ve been in here with me,” the Doctor mused, rolling onto his side and propping up on an elbow. “What are you reading?”

“Your log.” The Master showed him the TARDIS encoded numeric shorthand on the portable. “I’d forgotten a TARDIS keeps its own diary. It took me nearly two hours to remember the system.”

“I’ve always felt the stuff reads badly,” the Doctor confessed, not wishing to upset his machine, but compelled to bitch.

“Well, me too, but your Type 40 seems to have more of a grasp of how to log her information coherently.” The Master smiled a little. “You and she have had a grand old tear through time and space. Right now I’m reading what you did in your last body.” His eyes slid to the Doctor before moving back. “I can’t help but be a little glad I didn’t run into you then. He’d have kicked my arse as soon as look at me.”

“No, he wouldn’t have,” the Doctor said immediately. “He’d have cried on you. Your absence is a gaping wound.”

The Master put down the portable and met his eyes fully. “You mean that.”

“Yes.”

“And you weren’t going to tell me?”

“Maybe not. Probably not. You tend to react very badly at sentiment. Too, my feelings aren’t fair. They’re an obligation.” The Doctor cleared his throat but forced himself to keep the Master’s gaze. “Anything that forces your mind or hands tends to get turned upon and shredded.”

The Master’s eyes measured him, seeking the inside of him. He got up and came to the bed. Saying nothing, he leaned over and kissed the Doctor’s mouth very softly. “You don’t have to keep your sentiment to yourself,” he said.

 

 


End file.
